


'Tis but a scratch (I lied, please help me)

by forensicleaf



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hurt Peter Parker, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Insomnia, Iron Dad, Kidnapping, Mind Manipulation, Poison, Spidey son, Suicidal Thoughts, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Whumptober, Whumptober 2018, peter is not completely straight, we aren't putting labels on it
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-09
Updated: 2019-01-17
Packaged: 2019-07-28 16:09:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 10
Words: 24,045
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16245200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/forensicleaf/pseuds/forensicleaf
Summary: My very belated contribution to 31 days of whump, mostly featuring Peter Parker and Tony Stark and their father/son relationship. Tags and warnings will be added as chapters are published. Individual chapters also carry trigger warnings in the notes.Now up: Chapter 10 - Bruises.





	1. Stabbed

Peter doesn’t feel the pain right away.

What he does register is the way the other man’s eyes widen as he staggers back, the knife in his hand gleaming scarlet under the streetlights.

What he does register is the way all the air seems to vacate his lungs.

What he does register are the flashing red warnings blinking in the corner of his Heads Up Display, Karen’s voice in his ear, less calm than usual.

He’s…he’s just been stabbed.

“Fuck,” the guy’s friend says, high and panicked, “we – we gotta go.” He tugs at the back of the man’s jacket, staring at Peter in terror. “Nix, we gotta go.”

Peter brings his hand up to his side, to just below his ribs where what had started as a dull ache has now begun to burn. He tries to take in a breath, but it hurts, bright sparks of pain lighting up along the path the blade had travelled. His hand is wet, the fabric of his glove soaked through in seconds.

“ _Nix!_ ”

The man, Nix, lets himself be pulled, face white and eyes flicking between Peter’s face and down to his side, and then the two men are half running, half stumbling out of the alley and out of view.

Peter wheezes, throwing a hand out to the wall for support as his legs give out.

“Karen,” his voice is breathy, quiet. He’s panting, short and shallow – anything more feels like being stabbed all over again, like fire in his chest. “Karen how bad?”

Bad. He already knows it’s bad. So when she tells him the knife has punctured his right lung and the reason he’s having trouble breathing is because A, there’s a hole in his lung, and B, because any breaths he does take are escaping out of said hole and into his chest cavity where the build-up of air is quickly hindering his ability to expand his lung, Peter laughs.

It’s a hysterical, sort of sob-laugh. And then it’s just a sob.

Then it’s just tears because sobbing hurts too much.

“Peter, you need medical attention,” Karen’s voice is soft, but urgent. “There’s a hospital three blocks away. I’m lighting up the fastest route now.”

Three blocks. Three blocks isn’t far, Peter thinks, but then he tries to move and discovers that three blocks can be very far indeed.

He barely makes it to his feet, and then less than ten halting, shuffling steps later he has to stop, leaning heavy against the wall, shaking and sweating and breaths whistling in and out. He… can’t. He just can’t.

Oh God, he’s in serious trouble.

“K-Karen,” he whispers through chattering teeth as he slides back to the floor. His voice trails off. He forgets what he was going to say.

The cold October air is seeping into his bones and it makes him shiver. He looks down to the only part of him that feels warm; his suit is a whole different shade of red there and all the way down to his hips. His hand feels fuzzy pressed against the wound. His head feels fuzzy. He’s tired.

“Peter, you are going into shock.”

Karen’s voice snaps him back. He sucks in a breath and whines at the sharp-hot pain that lances through his side.

“I – I,” he starts, but his tongue feels heavy, and he can’t form the words. He feels like he’s sinking into the concrete.

“Tattletale protocol activated.”

There’s a beat of silence, or maybe it’s an hour, then a completely different voice fills his ears.

“I’m on my way, kid. I’m coming. Jesus, you don’t do things by halves do you?”

Peter drags in a breath and it hurts, it hurts, it _hurts_.

“Mis…ter,” he wheezes. It’s all he has the air for.

“Yeah,” Tony sounds breathless, too. “Yeah, I’m coming for you kid - five minutes tops. You’re gonna be okay. You’re gonna be fine. Just stay with me.”

“Mmm,” Peter breathes, but he can already feel himself sliding. His body is both light and heavy. His vision is swimming, darkness encroaching on the edges.

His hand falls away from his side.

“Pete, you hang on, all right? I’m almost there. I’m almost there.”

There’s an edge to Mr Stark’s voice that Peter doesn’t think he’s heard before. He almost sounds… scared, but that’s silly because Peter doesn’t even really hurt anymore. His accelerated healing must be kicking in. He’s going to be fine. It’s going to be fine.

“’s fine,” he breathes. Or he thinks he does. His ears are full of the sound of waves, which he thinks is strange because he’s nowhere near the beach. He doesn’t like the beach much anymore - not since he’d crashed a plane on one, but the gentle roar of the sea lulls him.

Then over the sound of waves, a thump - metal hitting concrete.

Red and gold in his blurry vision before his eyes are too heavy to keep open.

“Oh, kid.”

He feels a hand slide around his back, another under his knees, and it doesn’t hurt – nothing hurts anymore. He’s gently lifted, and he rolls his face towards the warmth he can feel radiating from the suit.

“It’s gonna be okay,” Tony says, and there’s that edge again. “You’re gonna be okay.”

Peter smiles. Of course he is. Iron Man is here.


	2. Bloody Hands

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> THIS CHAPTER DEALS WITH SUICIDAL THOUGHTS / A POTENTIAL SUICIDE SITUATION. NOTHING HAPPENS AND IT ISN'T EXPLICIT BUT PLEASE BE SAFE.
> 
> “Kid, please, listen to me.”
> 
> But Peter isn’t. He’s staring down at his hands, palms up, fingers splayed, and he’s crying - tears hanging from his chin before their weight carries them to the ground so, so many floors below.
> 
> He isn’t wearing his webshooters.

“Peter!”

The shout is torn from his throat involuntarily as the kid teeters just a bit closer towards falling into empty air. His toes stick out over the ledge, and for some reason that’s the detail that Tony fixes on – the kid isn’t even wearing shoes, just those obnoxious Pokémon socks that he knows May bought as a joke, but Peter wears all the time.

Tony stands a few feet to the side of him, arm outstretched, but too afraid to step any closer – too afraid that the kid will jump if he does. The wind whips Peter’s hair into an unruly mop as it howls around them, biting and cold.

“Kid, please, listen to me.”

But Peter isn’t. He’s staring down at his hands, palms up, fingers splayed, and he’s crying - tears hanging from his chin before their weight carries them to the ground so, so many floors below.

He isn’t wearing his webshooters.

“Pete,” Tony says, unable to stop his voice from shaking, “Pete, just – just come down. We can talk about it, we can -”

Peter sways on the ledge, and Tony’s words die in his throat. He fights against every instinct telling him to leap forward and rip the kid back to safety, knowing Peter is faster than he could ever be.

The kid sucks in a breath, raw and ragged.

“I killed her,” he says, anguish embedded in every word, and Tony feels his heart slam in his chest.

Even though he knows it’s absurd, he finds himself asking, “What? Who?”

Peter shakes his head back and forth and back and forth frantically like he’s trying to dislodge the answer to that question from his mind.

“I don’t – I don’t know why. I don’t – I loved her. I don’t know why I would – I was so angry and I – I -“ The kid sounds wrecked, words trailing off into a broken sob as he looks down at his hands once more. He clenches them into fists, but quickly straightens his fingers again, gagging.

Peter killed someone? No. There’s no way. Tony knows it in his bones. Peter isn’t a murderer. What the hell is going on here?

He tries to piece together the puzzle. There can only be one person Peter would be this worked up over losing - only one person whose loss would gut him so completely.

“May?” he asks, brows creasing into a frown, and he knows he’s guessed right from the way Peter seems to fold in on himself, tears spilling from his eyes as he clenches them shut. “Kid, no. No. May’s fine. You just spoke to her, remember? She gave you the all clear to camp here for the night.”

Peter seems to stiffen.

“No,” he says. “No, I – I remember. I -” He’s looking at his hands again, and his voice is thin, almost inaudible as he says, “the blood.”

And Tony understands then. He hadn’t been paying attention because he was too preoccupied with making sure that the kid didn’t take that one step too far, but now he sees the way Peter has been holding his hands out this whole time, arms half-raised, away from his body, like he can’t bear to have them touch him, touch his clothes – like they’re covered in something. Like they’re covered in blood.

“Pete, listen. There’s nothing on your hands. There’s no blood.”

“Don’t,” Peter pleads, wobbling a little as a particularly strong gust sweeps across the roof. His fingers twitch. “It’s – I can feel – I can -”

“No,” Tony says firmly. “No, kid. It isn’t real. There’s no blood. I promise. May’s fine. She’s alive.” Although he can’t guarantee she isn’t going to have a _heart attack_ when she finds out about this.  “You come down and we’ll call her right now.”

Peter hesitates, still looking down at his hands. Then slowly, slowly, he lifts his head and turns to look at Tony, and Tony sucks in a sharp breath - because now he can see the torment plain as day on the kid’s face, the streaks of shed tears on red cheeks. But more importantly, he can see his eyes.

Tony remembers the vibrant blue that Barton’s eyes had glowed when he’d been under the control of Loki and his sceptre, and he remembers the bright scarlet that had ringed Thor’s pupils that Christmas when Wanda had taken control of his mind (at his request) and made him think it was snowing indoors. This is the same, and different.

Peter’s eyes just look like Peter’s eyes…but they’re clouded - smoky tendrils curling through the warm brown like mist floating over a lake.

And he remembers now that the kid had mentioned he had a run in with that fishbowl guy – Mysterio – earlier that day. Tony had brushed it off because at that point the guy had been little more than a nuisance, parlour tricks and smoke-screen robberies, but now – _now,_ the man has signed his own death warrant.

Peter speaks slowly, hesitantly.

“She – she’s okay?”

He looks so torn, so confused, so _hopeful,_ that Tony feels the flames of rage igniting in his chest. He’s going to smash that fishbowl to pieces.

“I promise, kid,” he says, edging forward slightly, then further when Peter doesn’t back up or move away. He holds his hand out toward Peter, who regards him with those swirling eyes for a moment, searching his face for a lie. Then, with only a slight falter, the kid drops his own hand into Tony’s outstretched palm.

Tony grasps him tight, pulling him gently but forcefully down from the ledge, barely breathing until the kid’s Pokémon socked feet are firmly planted in front of his and he has a solid two-handed grip on his shoulders.

Peter blinks, then shakes his head a little, breathing in short puffs. As Tony watches, his irises clear – that grey smoke dissipating until all that’s left is brown.

“Oh,” Peter breathes. He looks at his hands again – his perfectly clean hands - then back at the ledge, and when he turns back to Tony his face is pale, eyes wide. He starts to shake. “Oh my god. I almost – I couldn’t - ”

Tony pulls him into a hug, and Peter’s fingers fist into the back of his shirt.

“You got whammied, kid. Happens to the best of us.” He was aiming for a light tone, but it falls flat even to his own ears. _Too close._ He tightens his arms around the kid’s shoulders. “You’re okay.”

Peter pulls back, rubs at his eyes.

“Can I… can I call May? I don’t know where my phone is.”

Tony does; it’s on the counter in the kitchen. Peter had walked right past it on his zombie trek to the roof. He can’t bring himself to think about that right now, so he pulls his own phone from his pocket.

“F.R.I., call May Parker,” he says as he hands the device to Peter.

He tries to give the kid some privacy while he speaks to his aunt, but they’re still on the roof and even though he knows Peter is out from under the hypnosis now, there’s no way in hell he is moving from between the kid and the ledge.

Peter ends the call quickly, swiping at his eyes as he hands the phone back and says, “thank you.” Tony knows he’s not just talking about the phone.

He runs his hand affectionately over the top of the kid’s head where the hair is all stuck up and fluffy.

“C’mon,” he says, looping his arm around Peter’s shoulder and guiding them towards the access door.

“Hey, Mr Stark?” Peter says quietly as they walk.

“Yeah.”

“Don’t take this the wrong way, but…can you take me home?”

“Sure thing, kid,” Tony says. “I’ll even let you pick the car.”


	3. Insomnia

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s not that he doesn’t want to sleep – Jesus, does he want to sleep – it’s just that he can’t. It’s been days since he had a proper rest, and every day that passes makes him feel more and more like he’s losing his mind – like he doesn’t even know who he is anymore. He feels like a Picasso painting – bits and pieces of person jumbled together to form something resembling himself.

 

 The clock ticks over from 3:36 to 3:37 and Peter lies there, staring at the ceiling.

It’s a ceiling he’s intimately familiar with at this point; he’s memorised every crack and blemish in the paintwork, can accurately predict the angles of the shadows thrown across it and how they’ll shift with the rising sun.

The underside of the top bunk…he’d memorised that too before he’d crawled up to try and sleep in it, worn out and frustrated with tossing and turning in the bottom one.

It’s not that he doesn’t want to sleep – Jesus, does he want to sleep – it’s just that he _can’t._ It’s been days since he had a proper rest, and every day that passes makes him feel more and more like he’s losing his mind – like he doesn’t even know who he is anymore. He feels like a Picasso painting – bits and pieces of person jumbled together to form something resembling himself.

 _If I fall asleep now,_ he thinks, shifting onto his side, _I have just over two hours until I have to get up for school._

Then slowly it becomes one hour. Then thirty minutes. And then the clock ticks over to six AM and Peter’s phone starts going off with that alarm that had (at the time) seemed like the least annoying one of the bunch, but now makes him grind his teeth and hit _stop_ so fast the thing barely manages to get a single note out.

He presses the heels of his hands to his eyes and takes a deep breath, thinks about every individual step involved in getting up, getting ready, getting to school, _surviving_ school – every single hurdle he has to jump until he can come right back here and do this all over again.

It seems impossible.

He gets out of bed.

 

* * *

 

 

School is a blur. A painful, torturous blur.

He doesn’t even feel human as he walks the halls, shuffling from class to class. He finds himself zoning out in Spanish and History, and when he’s called on to answer a question in Biology, he blurts out the first thing that comes to mind and gets it wrong – much to Flash’s enjoyment.

More than once he catches Ned shooting him worried looks from the corner of his eye, until finally at lunch his friend asks, “Dude, are you okay?”

For some reason, Peter bristles, feels annoyance flood his chest and press hard against his sternum.

“I’m fine,” he says tightly.

“You sure, man? You look -”

“I said I’m fine, Ned.” He doesn’t shout it – he doesn’t have the energy for that – but he might as well have. Like the shrinking light of a dying fire, his anger dissipates, gone as quickly as it had arrived. He drops his head into his hands. “Shit, sorry, I-”

“It’s okay. We’ve been friends for a long time. I know you’re an asshole when you’re tired.”

Peter twists his head in his hands to throw Ned a _look._

“Seriously,” Ned continues, unfazed by his glare, “when did you last sleep? You look like an extra from The Walking Dead – like, season four onward when they started getting really gross.”

Peter grimaces. “Thanks.”

“Is it the… extracurricular stuff?” he says carefully. “‘Cause I know that’s’ important, and like, important to you, but – you gotta take care of yourself, too.”

Peter doesn’t tell him that he hasn’t put the suit on in days, that it’s taking all he has just to function, forget swinging around skyscrapers and beating down bad guys. This inability to rest isn’t anything to do with Spider-man; this is just…him. He smiles, knowing it doesn’t reach his eyes and says, “Thanks, man.”

Ned doesn’t mention it again, but he does spend the rest of the day subtly helping out just that little bit more in class, nudging Peter when Mrs Warren’s eyes hover a little too long on his spaced-out form, and going over the stuff Peter misses in his moments of insomnia-induced inattentiveness. Peter appreciates it more than he can say.

In a laughable parallel of how he has been spending his nights recently, most of the afternoon passes with him watching the clock slowly tick round in increments, minute by minute, until finally, finally it reaches 2:30 and the bell rings.

He makes his way down the front steps of the school, full of relief and dread in equal parts – relief that he doesn’t have to spend all his energy concentrating anymore, and dread at the thought of another sleepless night.

Regardless, he can’t wait to get home and throw on some pyjamas and –

He sees the black car parked up the road, just out of the way of the steady stream of students trickling out of the gates and his heart plummets. It’s… is it Friday? Oh, man, it’s Friday. He’d completely forgotten he arranged to head up to the compound so Mr Stark could fix a couple of bugs in his suit. All hope of a restful evening floats away, and Peter could almost cry.

For a brief, hysterical second, he considers just leaving and texting Mr Stark later that something came up, or that he forgot. But he could never actually do that, not when Mr Stark has been so helpful and supportive to him. And he _likes_ spending time at the compound, with Mr Stark, messing around in the lab and working on tech the rest of the kids at Midtown could only dream of.

With a deep breath, he turns and shuffles dejectedly towards the car, trying to muster some of his usual enthusiasm.

Thankfully, Happy isn’t in a talking mood – not that he’s ever – and that suits Peter just fine, although he doesn’t miss the concerned glances that are thrown his way in the rear-view mirror. He leans his head back against the plush leather of the seat and closes his eyes, feeling the gentle vibration of the engine hum through the car as they drive.

The noise of traffic and people dies down as they head out of the city, leaving only the steady rumble of rolling tyres. The roads are wider heading upstate, fewer cars occupying the lanes, and the constant, jarring stop/start nature of driving in New York City gradually tails off and leads to a smooth, uninterrupted ride.

Inexplicably, Peter feels himself drifting. At first, he’s almost too aware of it to let it happen, but the longer they travel, the deeper he sinks, breathing evening out.

He rouses slightly, hearing Happy speak, and he thinks he hears Mr Starks’s voice, too, but their tones are hushed, and the pull of sleep is stronger than his desire to know what they’re talking about, so he gives in to it, slipping under once again to the murmur of wheels on tarmac.

_“Kid.”_

The word floats to him on a breeze. Cool air brushing his face.

“Kid.”

There’s a hand on his shoulder, and it gives him a gentle shake. He blinks his eyes open, brow furrowing as he tries to clear the sleep from his brain.

“Happy?” he mumbles, realising who it is standing in the open wing of the car door.

“Yeah. We’re here.”

“Oh. Oh, okay,” Peter says, stretching his arms and sluggishly moving to get out of the car. He falters, half out of the door when he registers the colour of the sky – a palette of deep indigo sweeping through to a steadily darkening cerulean.

He looks to Happy, confused.

“What… what time is it?”

“A little after eight,” Happy says.

 _Eight?_ No, that’s not possible. It’s a two hour drive to the compound, tops, even accounting for traffic. They can’t have been driving around for… five hours. Although, now that he thinks about it, he feels… if not rested, at least a fair amount better than he had when he had climbed into the car - like he’s slept longer than the short time it should have taken to get here.

He closes the car door, shifts his backpack onto his shoulder, eyeing Happy suspiciously.

Happy catches his eye, looks away and says gruffly, “What? I felt like taking the scenic route.”

“Happy…” Peter starts, feeling oddly touched.

“Don’t make a big deal of it,” Happy says, looking incredibly uncomfortable. “Now c’mon, Tony’s waiting.”

He turns to head into the compound, beckoning for Peter to follow. Peter stands for a moment, stunned, then hurries to catch up, a smile finding its way onto his face – the first proper one he’s had in days.

“Aww, Happy, I knew you cared.”

Happy looks horrified. He shoves Peter gently away from him.

“Shut up,” he says, and Peter laughs.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oof this one was like drawing blood from a stone and I'm still not sure about it, but I guess this challenge is nothing if not an exercise in writing. Hopefully it's not too awful? Let me know what you think!


	4. No, stop!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNING: THIS CHAPTER DEALS WITH PAST CHILDHOOD SEXUAL ABUSE, AND ITS LINGERING EFFECTS. IT INCLUDES A DREAMSCAPE REMEMBERING OF SAID ABUSE. NOTHING IS TOO EXPLICIT, BUT PLEASE BE SAFE.

 

_The shadow doesn’t have a face, but Peter knows its name – couldn’t forget it if he tried. It looms over him, dark and absolute, sucking all the light from the room, all the warmth._

_The voice, he doesn’t remember so well - his memory diluted and substituted over the years with the voices of the bad guys on the Saturday morning cartoons he used to watch - but the one that floats to his ears when the shadow speaks sends icy-cold fear sliding down his spine all the same._

_“Come on, Einstein. Don’t you want to play?”_

_“No,” he tries to say, but nothing comes out - not even a whisper. He tries to pull the covers over his face, to hide, but they’re gone._

_The shadow moves closer._

_“I thought we were friends.”_

_“Please don’t,” Peter whimpers, but again, his voice is lost to the void. He gasps in ragged breaths. He wants to jump up - to run away, but he can’t move. He’s paralysed by fear._

_No. By webs._

_They’re all over him - pinning his arms and legs to the mattress, sticking to his hair. He pulls against them but they’re too strong. He can’t get out. He can’t –_

_“It’s just a game.”_

_The darkness surges forward and envelops him and he can’t move._ He can’t move _. It’s in his eyes and in his ears and it’s pouring down his throat. It’s sliding down his chest. Down his stomach._

_“Don’t you want to be a good friend?”_

_“No,-“_

“- stop!”

In the dream world it’s a silent scream; in reality it’s a sleep-slurred yell, and Peter jolts awake as it reaches his ears, the feel of the words still lingering on his lips.

His heart is pounding uncomfortably hard, the sound of it pulsing through his skull. Adrenaline floods his body, telling him to move, move, _move,_ but he freezes, held still by fear. This isn’t his bed, this isn’t his room, he doesn’t know where he is, he –

 _Compound,_ his mind supplies after a few seconds.

_Safe._

His breath escapes him in a rush, muscles slowly unlocking as his pulse begins to even out. He pushes himself up so his back is against the headboard, drawing his knees in to his chest and trying not to think about the content of the dream. He hasn’t thought about _that_ in a long time. He’s shaking – damp with sweat, damp with –

_Oh no._

His body flushes cold.

_Oh God. No, no, no, no, no, no._

He throws the covers off, scrambling to his feet at the side of the bed where he stands and stares in horror at the damp patch in the centre of the mattress. No, this – he’s past this. He hasn’t - this hasn’t happened in years – he doesn’t – _shit._

He’s tearing the sheets off before he can even process what he’s doing, sheer panic driving his hands.

“No, no, no, no, nonononono.” It’s like he’s stuck on repeat – like if he says the word enough times, this won’t be happening. Not _here._

 _Please,_ not here.

But as he clicks the lamp on, the sheets are still in a soggy, accusing heap on the floor, and he’s still in the Avengers’ compound, and his pants are still -

Fuck, he needs to – he needs to change, he needs to – where is his bag?

He doesn’t have any spare pyjamas, so he has to settle for the pair of joggers he’d stuffed in there as an afterthought, pulling them on over a fresh pair of boxers, then he stands there, pile of sheets and clothes at his feet and fingers grasping at his hair. He’s on the verge of tears - not because of the nightmare, even though admittedly it’s rattled him, but because he’s fucking fifteen years old and he’s just wet the bed at the goddamn Avengers facility of all places. Some fucking hero he is.

It’s not his fault. He _knows_ it’s not. Years of therapy surrounding countless dreams and nights like tonight have taught him that. But that doesn’t make him feel any better standing here now staring at a mound of soiled sheets.

Why here? Why tonight? God, what is he going to do? What is he –

“F.R.I.D.A.Y,” he whispers, stumbling over to the desk and pulling up the holo-screen interface there with trembling fingers.

“How can I help you, Peter?”

“ _Shh,_ shh,” he says, nearly jumping out of his skin at the volume of her reply, “night-time voice, F.R.I.D.A.Y. Please, _please,_ be quiet.”

“Sorry, Peter – I’m used to night owls around here,” she says, much quieter, “Is this better?”

“Yeah. Yeah. That’s good.”

“What can I do for you?”

“Can you – can you show me where the laundry room is?” He hasn’t been there before – has never had any reason to go before now.

“Laundry is located in the East Wing, basement level one.” A 3-D blueprint of the compound flashes up on the screen before the display zooms in on the room in question. The perimeter pulses bright blue. “Would you like me to illuminate the path for you?”

“No,” he says quickly. “No thanks, F.R.I.D.A.Y – I got it.”

He gathers the bedsheets and the clothes into a bundle, wrapping everything up in the duvet cover and opens the bedroom door, straining to listen for any movement. The compound is silent, as it usually is this time of night, and he steps out into the hallway, making sure to catch the door with his foot as it swings shut, letting it close with a soft _click_.

He pads quietly down the corridor, realising as the cold seeps into the soles of his feet that he hadn’t put any shoes on in his hurry – not even socks. A shiver runs through him. He doesn’t often wander around the compound this late, and for whatever reason he finds the nocturnal lighting especially eerie tonight. Maybe it’s just ‘cause he’s on edge already.

He rounds the corner which leads to the common area, and freezes.

The light is on in the kitchen.

 _Maybe somebody left it on by accident_ , he thinks – he _hopes_ – as he creeps forward slowly, but even as the thought crosses his brain, he hears footsteps.

There’s nowhere for him to hide, nowhere for him to go as the person steps out into the hallway, silhouetted by the light streaming from the doorway. It’s – oh god, it’s Mr. Stark, and all Peter can do is stand there like a deer in headlights as he turns and spots him, confusion clouding his face.

“Pete?” he says, frowning a little as he makes his way down the hall towards him, “What’re you doing up?”

“I – um. I -” He’s all too aware that he looks the epitome of a cartoon burglar – creeping around in the dark with what is essentially a sack dangling from his hand. He sees Mr Stark glance at the bundle and his brain goes blank even as his cheeks start to burn. He can’t think of anything convincing to use as an excuse, and, like, Tony’s not _blind_ \- so he tells the truth, says: “Laundry.”

Mr Stark’s eyes flick to the sheets in Peters hand and back to his face.

“Too much soda before bed?” he jokes, but the way Peter’s chest seems to crumple in on itself at his words must be written all over his face, because his expression drops instantly. “Oh,” he says flatly, and Peter kind of wants to die. “Oh, kid – listen. It – it’s okay. It’s - I mean - lord knows it’s nothing I haven’t done after a heavy night on the sauce.” He pauses. “You’re not, are you? Drinking, I mean. ‘Cause Spider-man is one thing, but I think your aunt might actually off me if she finds out you’re getting trashed under my roof,” he says, chuckling awkwardly.

Peter doesn’t laugh. He can’t. There’s nothing funny about this. There’s pressure building in his chest and behind his eyes; he’s wound so tight he feels like he might snap.

In the silence, Mr Stark clears his throat.

“Seriously, Pete,” he says, “don’t worry about it. It happens.”

But it _doesn’t._ That’s the point. _He_ doesn’t. And now his childhood hero - freaking _Iron Man_ – thinks Spider-man is a pathetic kid who still pisses the bed at fifteen years old.

“No. I don’t -,” he chokes out around the golf ball-sized lump sitting in his throat, “I don’t do this. I don’t -”

“Kid, really – you don’t need to explain.”

But he does. He _does._

“I had a dream,” he says, feeling only slight flush of embarrassment as he clarifies, “a – a nightmare, really.”

Mr Stark looks at him, a thoughtful expression on his face.

“Okay…” he says carefully. When Peter doesn’t continue he asks, “Do you… want to talk about it?”

The air vacates Peter’s lungs in a rush.

“No,” he says quickly. Then, “Maybe. I don’t know.”

They stand in silence for a minute, Peter trying to keep his breathing even. Tony waits - not expectantly, but …patiently, perhaps? And Peter gets the feeling he’d just drop the whole thing if Peter asked him to. That’s probably the reason he finds himself speaking again.

He takes a deep breath.

“When I was nine, I… I had a babysitter,” he says. “He was an older kid from down the hall. He -” Peter pauses. He’s not ashamed – he went through one of the worst things a person can go through and survived - if anything he’s proud of that, but… he still finds it difficult to talk about.

Mr Stark’s expression changes, a whirlwind of emotions crossing his face. He’s a smart man, Peter knows, and it doesn’t take much to put two and two together and make an incredibly depressing four.

“Peter,” he says, thickly, “you don’t have to tell me this. You don’t have to -”

“No, no, it’s – it was a long time ago,” Peter says. And it’s true – he rarely thinks about it; he’s mostly moved on – put that dark period in the past where it should stay. “It’s just… sometimes I have dreams and I…”

He trails off, not really knowing what to say. Tony is just looking at him, face pale, and Peter thinks _great, now I’ve made it awkward._ Then,

“Is he in jail?” Mr Stark asks, tightly.

Peter sighs. “Yeah, last I heard. I don’t really… yeah.”

“Good,” Mr Stark says, and something about the way he says it makes Peter feel very, very glad that they’re on the same side.

He jumps as Mr Stark claps his hands together.

“You tired?” he asks Peter, arching a brow.

“Uh,” Peter hesitates, slightly confused by the sudden change in direction the conversation has taken, “No? Not really.”

“Great.” Mr Stark gestures to the bundle of sheets Peter had almost forgotten he was holding. “Drop that in the chute and then meet me in the living room. Star Wars marathon - you and me. I’ll even throw in a tub of that mint choc chip you like so much.”

Peter’s jaw drops.

“There’s a chute?” he says incredulously. What the hell has he been doing sneaking around like he’d robbed the place?!

“That’s what you pick up on? Of course there’s a chute. You think I’d make everyone _walk_ to the laundry room like we’re living in the dark ages?” He shakes his head. “That way. Opposite Wanda’s old room.”

Peter rolls his eyes and turns to go.

“Hey, kid,” Mr Stark calls, and Peter stops, looks back. Tony’s face is serious once more. “I’m proud of you,” he says.

Peter has to swallow hard before he can reply.

“Thanks, Mr Stark.”

Tony nods, once, and then the moment has passed and he’s shooing Peter down the hall.

“Come on, now, Star Wars time. Order of release, not chronological. We’re starting with A New Hope.”

 _Yes,_ Peter thinks as he settles down on the couch, taking the tub of ice cream Mr Stark offers him, _yes we are._

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay... I'm very much not sure about this one. I think it's quite possibly the darkest thing I've written. I've tried my best to handle this sensitive matter, but if anything I have included is offensive or incorrect, please let me know.
> 
> On a side note... these fics keep getting longer and longer. I swear I'll be writing a 10k by the time I get to prompt 31!
> 
> As always, please leave a comment and tell me what you think. I thrive on feedback!


	5. Poisoned

 

Tony’s head snaps up at the loud thump that reverberates through the ceiling from the floor above. A second later another faint sound reaches his ears – the unmistakable tinkering of glass shattering on tile.

“F.R.I.D.A.Y?” he murmurs, hand sliding across the table toward the gauntlet he’d been updating earlier that night. He isn’t completely on the defensive, not yet - unexpected interruptions like this aren’t altogether uncommon since he bought the penthouse in Manhattan - but the sound of things breaking… that’s new.

“Mr Parker has just entered via the balcony, boss,” F.R.I.D.A.Y informs him, and Tony drops the gauntlet back onto the desk with a roll of his eyes and a worn out sigh. “He… appears to be having a little difficulty.”

Tony frowns, pushing his stool away from the table and getting to his feet.

“Difficulty with what?” he asks as he quickly begins to make his way toward the main living space. Is the kid injured? If he is it can’t be anything too serious or else the kid’s A.I would have pinged his; there are protocols in place for that.

 _Unless something interfered with the suit,_ an unhelpful part of his brain supplies. He picks up his pace, now imagining the worst.

“He seems to be exhibiting signs of loss of motor control and poor coordination,” F.R.I.D.A.Y tells him, sensing he is on the move and switching speakers to follow him. “His heart rate is elevated.”

 _Fuck._ Tony is running now.

“How bad is he hurt?” he asks tightly, taking the stairs up to the living area two at a time.

“I’m picking up minor cuts and bruises, but nothing that would indicate serious injury.”

Confusion sweeps through him at that statement, but he doesn’t slow down. Maybe she’s missing something; maybe her sensors are damaged; maybe –

He swings round the corner into the open-plan space with his heart in his throat, and stops. The balcony door is hanging half off its hinges, a small crack in the glass where the handle has bounced off the next pane; Pepper’s favourite vase lies in shattered pieces on the kitchen floor, surrounded by water and Autumn-coloured lilies; and between the two of them is Peter – draped over one of the counter stools and clinging on to the breakfast bar like his life depends on it. There’s what looks like a small tear in the arm of his suit, but otherwise he appears uninjured.

As Tony enters the room Peter’s head rolls heavily on his neck, half-lidded eyes blinking lazily up at him from under a flop of hair that’s fallen over his face.

“M’s’er S’rk,” the kid slurs, wavering a little, and Tony finds himself switching gears from panicked to pissed in two seconds flat.

“Are you _drunk_?” he snaps, striding forward. _He better fucking not be_. Tony’s got enough problems to deal with right now – Ross is breathing down his neck about the status of Cap and his buddies, the re-writing of those damned Accords is giving him sleepless nights, and he’s all-too-aware that in addition to that, the activities of a certain red and blue-clad Spider-kid are starting to draw attention from up top. The very last thing he needs right now are Spider-man’s drunken shenanigans being broadcast on every news outlet in the Tri-state area. How could Peter be so _stupid_? And in the suit, no less. God knows what kind of damage he could have caused.

But almost as soon as the words are out of Tony’s mouth, he can see that he’s wrong – despite his heavy lids, Peter’s eyes are clear, focused, and now that Tony is closer he can see the fear in them too.

“Nuh. No,” Peter says thickly between laboured breaths. He might be trying to shake his head, but his chin drops against his chest, neck no longer able to support the weight.

“What happened?” Tony asks sharply, taking Peter’s face in his hands. The kid leans into them, blinking slowly, though his eyes are bright with uncapped terror. Tony’s heart thumps hard in his chest. “F.R.I.D.A.Y, what’s wrong with him?”

There’s a beat before she answers him, and her voice is hesitant.

“I’m not sure, boss. His symptoms are advancing rapidly, but I can’t isolate a cause.”

“Ca’,” Peter mumbles unintelligibly against Tony’s palm. “S’rash.”

Tony snaps his eyes to Peter’s heavy-lidded ones. He searches the kid’s face for the meaning of his words, panic settling high in his throat. “What? I don’t -”

Peter repeats himself, right hand sliding across the bench and lifting a little to paw clumsily at his left arm before dropping back onto the surface with a thud. Tony turns the kid’s arm toward him slightly, sees the tear in the suit that he had dismissed on first look. It’s actually not one tear, but four, and in the gaps between the fabric he counts four perfectly parallel bloody scratches, the grooves carved deep into the skin.

_S’rash._

“Scratch? It’s the scratches?” Tony asks urgently, already knowing that it has to be. Peter makes a soft noise of confirmation against his hand. His eyes are barely slits in his pale face.

“Okay, good,” Tony says. “Okay.” But it’s anything but. Scratches alone wouldn’t cause such an extreme reaction. Not unless whatever made them was coated in something.

“Absorption of a substance through the bloodstream could explain Peter’s symptoms,” F.R.I.D.A.Y says, obviously following his line of thought, “but I can’t recommend treatment without first knowing the original toxin.”

She’s careful not to say ‘poison’, although all three of them know that to be the case. The kid can no longer speak, can barely move. Whatever it is, it’s slowly paralysing him, shutting down his body one muscle at a time. If it continues, if they don’t work out what this is and how to stop it, pretty soon he won’t be able to breathe. And then…

_No. Not happening._

“Okay bud,” Tony says, hating what he’s about to do and knowing there’s no other option, “we gotta get you down to the lab. We gotta figure out what this is.” He can’t leave the kid here alone while he goes back down himself. What if something happens while he’s gone and he doesn’t make it back in time? He’d never forgive himself.

He slings Peter’s uninjured arm over his shoulders, wrapping his own around the kid’s waist. Peter’s head lolls against his chest as he sags into Tony’s hold, legs barely able to support his own weight. His breaths come out in short pants as he struggles to drag his feet forward.

Tony finds his own legs struggling as he half walks, half _drags_ Peter towards the elevator, and by the time they make it inside the car and the doors slide shut, they’re both sweating and breathing heavy with exertion. Tony feels Peter’s chest hitch against his side and he turns to see tears streaking down the kid’s face. Something tightens uncomfortably behind his sternum.

“We’re almost there, Pete,” he says, swiping the kid’s cheeks gently with the pad of his thumb. “Just a little further. We’re gonna figure this out, I promise.”

Peter doesn’t say anything, doesn’t make a noise, just sinks further into Tony’s hold as the elevator pings and the doors open on the lower level.

They’re halfway to the lab when Peter’s legs give out completely and he goes boneless, eyes closed. Tony nearly drops him, only just managing to catch him in an awkward hold that definitely pulls something in his shoulder and sends a sharp pain shooting across his upper back.

His pulse skyrockets, hands shaking.

“Peter!”

“He’s breathing, boss,” F.R.I.D.A.Y says, “but you need to hurry.”

Tony can see the slight rise and fall of Peter’s chest now, and his breath escapes him in a rush.

“C’mon kid, stay with me,” he says desperately, hissing through his teeth as he hooks his arms under Peter’s and starts to tug him the last few feet to the lab, shoulder protesting the motion. He lowers him to the floor of the lab as gently as he can, deciding not to waste precious time attempting to wrangle the kid onto the cot, and to F.R.I.D.A.Y he says, “F.R.I, I want you monitoring his vitals – heart rate, breathing, body temp, all of it.”

“Got it.”

His hands are a trembling blur as he swipes the deepest of the four cuts with a swab, trying not to think too hard about the fact that Peter doesn’t even flinch as he does.  

“Run this against the sample we have on file,” he says, voice tight, as he closes the door to the analysis chamber, bloody swab inside. He doesn’t know why he says it - F.R.I.D.A.Y knows what she’s doing. As the machine whirs to life, she’s already scouring every scientific and academic source she has access to, looking for symptoms that match Peter’s, ready to compare them to the foreign compounds she’s busy isolating from the swab.

He shoots a quick glance at Peter, then reluctantly – because he’s loath to think he might actually need to use any of the stuff – he rushes to the back of the lab.

Defibrillator, Ambu bag, adrenaline shot, saline, I.V – he has no idea how this is going to progress so he grabs it all, thankful that Pepper had insisted he have the place fully stocked. He barely breathes as he hurries back to Peter’s side, waiting for F.R.I.D.A.Y to announce his worst fears, but as the kid comes into view, Tony can see nothing has changed.

He takes a seat on the floor next to Peter, brushing the damp hair back from the kid’s forehead. Peter’s chest rises and falls - shallow and rapid - and Tony focuses on the motion, too afraid to look away – too afraid of what might happen if he does. In his free hand, he takes one of Peter’s, squeezing lightly.

“You’re gonna be okay.”

The kid’s hand is limp in his; his face is pale.

  _He’s alive,_ Tony reminds himself. _Please, kid. Please hang on._

Then Peter stops breathing.

Tony jolts like he’s been electrocuted, ice flooding from his chest all the way to the tips of his fingers.

“Boss!” F.R.I.D.A.Y’s voice is panicked, and absently he wonders why the hell he programmed her to do that, because in this moment all it does is accelerate his already dangerously high heartrate.

“I know, I see,” he chokes out. His chest is in a vice, dizziness sweeping over him, and all he can think is _not now._ He can’t afford to lose it now. He needs to _do_ something. The kid is fucking _dying_ right in front of him; he’s suffocating, lips steadily turning blue.

He snatches the Ambu bag off the table, nearly dropping it his hands are shaking so hard.

The mask goes over the kids face; Tony squeezes the cylinder; Peter’s chest expands.

“A little less pressure,” F.R.I.D.A.Y tells him. Tony is surprised he hears her over the roaring in his ears. “Every six seconds.”

Tony squeezes again, less forcefully. “His heart…”

“His heart is fine. Just keep him breathing. I’ve almost isolated the toxin.”

Tony counts to six and squeezes, counts to six and squeezes.

It goes like that for a few minutes, Peter’s chest rising and falling steadily, the blue tinge gradually disappearing from his face as the oxygen circulates his body.

_One, two, three, four, five, six, squeeze. One, two, three, four, five, six, squeeze._

Tony falls into the rhythm, focuses on the numbers, on contracting and flexing his fingers – anything to not have to think about the fact that he is literally holding the kid’s life in his hands.

_One, two, three, four, five, six, squeeze. One, two, three, four, five, six, squeeze._

The whirring of the analysis chamber stops, and F.R.I.D.A.Y says, “I’ve got it, boss.”

Tony braces himself, hand stilling mid-squeeze before he comes back to himself and realises what he’s doing.

“Peter’s going to be fine,” she continues. “It’s Tubocurarine – a muscle relaxant. Commonly used by South American tribes in hunting. It’s non-fatal if the victim receives respiratory support. The body metabolises it on its own after thirty minutes to two hours, but with Peter’s enhancements I imagine it’ll be sooner.”

Tony should be relieved – it’s not fatal, Peter’s not going to die – but dread sits like a cold stone in his gut. Because he’s familiar with the compound Tubocurarine, and he’s familiar with its other use – in early surgeries. It’s a paralytic, sure, but it does absolutely nothing to the central nervous system. Or to consciousness.

Meaning Peter’s been awake the whole time.

It’s a horror Tony can identify with more than he’d like. The memory of having his arc reactor torn out of his chest, unable to move a muscle, immobilised by a creation of his own design is one that still haunts his dreams. The thought of Peter lying there, slowly suffocating and being excruciatingly aware of every second sets his hands shaking anew. What if the kid hadn’t made it to the penthouse tonight? What if Tony had been staying upstate?

He swallows hard, pushing those thoughts to the back of his mind. He clears his throat.

“I know you can hear me, kid,” he says, “and I want you to know you’re gonna be all right. I’m not going anywhere.”

And then he talks - rambling on about everything and nothing as he continues pumping the Ambu bag. He tells Peter about the day he built J.A.R.V.I.S, and about the time in college when he and Rhodey got so wasted they couldn’t find their dorm and ended up crashing in the quad ( _you can tell him I told you next time you see him. He’ll hate it_ ). He tells him about the experimental armour he’s working on for the Iron Man suit, and the multitude of spec updates he’s got planned for Peter’s.

It takes ten minutes for Peter to start breathing on his own again. Another five for his eyes to flicker open.

When he’s able to speak, the first words out of his mouth are, “Thank you.” It’s a little garbled, but it’s the best sound Tony’s ever heard.

“Always, kid,” Tony says, giving his hand a squeeze. “I’ve got you.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for the delay! I spent the weekend away celebrating my lovely friend's birthday - not a whole lot of time for writing. I hope this makes up for the wait. It's the longest one so far.
> 
> Please don't forget to leave a comment to let me know what you think. I appreciate every single one of them more than I can say :)


	6. Betrayal

 

Peter’s feet pound against the forest floor as he runs, dirt kicking up at his heels and twigs scratching at his ankles. His lungs burn with exertion, but he can’t stop, not even to catch his breath. Not even for a moment.

“Pete!” a voice calls from the trees behind him.

 _Shit._ It’s too close. _Too close_. He’s been out here for hours now, and exhaustion weighs on his every cell, slowing his reflexes and muting his abilities. He should have been able to hear them coming from a mile away. As it is…

The sharp crack of a weapon’s discharge bounces off the trees and sends a bird lurching into the sky. Peter flinches, dodging to the left as the tree to his right takes a hit.

It feels like his heart can’t beat any quicker, and his adrenaline is all but depleted, but Peter still pushes his legs to stride further, faster, muscles burning with the effort. He doesn’t know how much longer he can do this; this place is huge, but not infinite, and sooner or later… sooner or later they’re going to find him. And then… And then…

Peter will lose.

“Pete!” the voice calls again, and its close proximity spurs him on.

His own gun bumps against his side as he runs, so far unused and only to _be_ used as a final resort. He doesn’t have his suit - or his web-shooters; it’s his last line of defence.

He crashes through the thicket, branches clawing at his face. He’s making too much noise, he _knows_ he is, but stealth means losing speed, and that he cannot afford.

Another sharp crack has him ducking right, slipping between two trees and into a small clearing.

 _Too exposed,_ he thinks, bolting for the other side.

Then something hooks his foot and he goes down hard.

The wind is knocked out of him as he hits the ground, his momentum sending him tumbling across the forest floor, the fallen red, orange, and yellow leaves crunching beneath him as he rolls.

For a moment the only sound is his harsh breathing, but then, heavy, fast, and growing closer – the sound of footsteps.

_Crap crap crap._

Where is his gun? He scrambles to his hands and knees, sweeping through the undergrowth for it, frantically searching for where it had landed when he’d fallen. _Where is it? Where is it?!_

The footsteps are almost on him, and he wars with himself, trying to decide if he should just leave his weapon and run. If he gets caught here, he’s finished. But then, from ten feet ahead of him, a glimmer; the sunlight breaking through the canopy and bouncing off metal.

He dives forward, knees sliding in the loose leaves. His fingers stretch out to grasp the gun and –

“Stop!”

He freezes. The voice comes from right behind him, and the hair on the back of Peter’s neck bristles at the phantom feel of the weapon he knows is trained on his back.

But Peter’s fast – he’s _really_ fast – and his gun is _right there._ All he’d have to do is lunge forward and flip and -

“Uh- uh,” the voice says, seemingly reading his intentions. Black boots step into his field of vision - close, but not too close.

 _Smart_ , Peter thinks begrudgingly. They know what he’s capable of.

He watches as his gun is kicked away, and the boots jump back a couple of quick steps, taking them out of his range. The only sound breaking the silence is two sets of lungs expanding and contracting rapidly. Even the birds are quiet.

Peter’s brain is tripping over itself trying to think of a way out of this. This is not how this ends. He refuses to let it be.

But he’s just so damn _tired_.

He turns slowly, rolling onto his back and pushing himself up with his elbows. His hair is plastered to his forehead, beads of sweat rolling down his temples, and his chest heaves with every gulping breath. His limbs feel like they’re made of rubber now that he’s finally allowed himself to stop, muscles quivering with exhaustion.

He stares down the muzzle of the gun, eyes following the length of the barrel until he’s looking at the face of the man holding it.

“Mr Stark,” he says. His voice is hoarse from the cold October air.

“Parker,” Mr Stark says. The barrel of the gun twitches up towards the sky and back down in a short, sharp motion. “Get up.”

Peter swallows. His throat is so dry it hurts. “Mr-”

“I’m not doing this with you on the ground. Stand up.”

He’s serious. Hesitating for only a moment, Peter forces his aching body to its knees. Then slowly, torturously, he gets his feet under him. His legs shake with the effort of holding him up.

His hands hang loosely at his sides as he meets eyes with the man who has been his mentor, his friend… his father figure.

“You don’t have to do this,” he says weakly.

“You know I do.”

“No, you could - you could let me go,” Peter tries.

Mr Stark shakes his head. “Pete…”

But Peter sees the indecision on his face.

“S-same team, remember?”

There’s a long pause, and Peter thinks maybe, _maybe,_ Mr Stark is going to let him run.

But his hope is premature.

It’s almost imperceptible, but Peter sees the shift in his face – sees when hesitation becomes resolution, the minute twitch of his finger on the trigger.

“No, _wait_!” he shouts.

The gun goes off.

It hits Peter in the chest, knocking the air from his lungs, and for a second he’s stunned - surprised that something so small could hurt so much. And then he looks down. Sees the red spreading, dripping down his front.

_He actually did it._

Another crack of the gun, and a splash of bright yellow joins the red.

“Hey!” Peter yells indignantly, looking up with a glare.

Mr Stark barks a laugh.

“Sorry, kid. Double tap. Always,” he says. Then he lets the paintball gun drop to his side, touches his fingers to his ear and says into his comm, “I do believe that’s a win for Team Red.”

Whoops and cheers make their way from the comm to Peter’s ears and he scowls, his fingers sliding through the gloopy mess on his chest. “ _I’m_ team red,” he mutters.

“Not today, you’re not. I distinctly remember you siding with Cap.”

Peter scoffs. “He picked me for his team! What was I supposed to do?”

“I don’t want to hear it, Judas,” Mr Stark says, waving a hand.

_Judas?!_

“He only did it ‘cause you picked Bucky first. So really, it’s your fault.”

“And clearly it was the smart choice because – oh look – we won.”

“You’re a sore winner, you know,” Peter says as he reaches down to retrieve his own gun. He didn’t even get to use it – defensive over offensive has always been more his style.

“You know who says that?” Mr Stark asks, spreading his arms wide, “sore losers. Now come on, we gotta get back so we can celebrate – and by we I mean me.”

He turns to go, cocking his head for Peter to follow.

 _Freaking Judas_ , Peter thinks with a roll of his eyes as he starts forward, _what a joke._

Then…

He does it almost without thinking; two sharp cracks and Mr Stark stumbles forward slightly, orange and green mixing together on the back of his jacket.

For a moment, the two of them stand perfectly still, then slowly, very slowly, Mr Stark turns his head.

His expression is perfectly blank, his inflection just as much so as he says, “Peter.”

“Heh,” Peter laughs shakily as he takes a small step back.

Turns out he can still run after all.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Was it too obvious? I was trying to be clever but sometimes it backfires!
> 
> Special thanks to whumphoarder and their awesome fic 'Super Kid, Super Hearing' for giving me an idea here, but I don't want to spoil it for those who haven't read. If you haven't, go read it now!
> 
> If you liked it, hated it, just want to tell me what you had for dinner, please leave a comment! Reading them makes me happy :)


	7. Kidnapped

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNINGS FOR THIS CHAPTER: LEWD IMPLICATIONS MADE BY A CREEP REGARDING A MINOR (NOTHING EXPLICIT), VIOLENCE AGAINST MINORS (IN THEME OF KIDNAPPING)

 

Peter hooks a left out of the school gates, popping his headphones in his ears as he walks.

It’s October, but fall’s been coming on slow this year and today is unseasonably warm, so it seems as good a day as any for a quick detour before he heads home. There’s this new cookie dough café he’s been wanting to try for weeks, just off 47th. He figures he’ll swing by there, load up on sugar (get something for May, too, of course) and then just catch the train from Rockerfeller. From there it’s straight up Spider-manning ‘til his May-imposed curfew.

It’s been weird, getting used to having people around him who know about his other life. He’d spent months trying to adjust to his new abilities all by himself - juggling taking down bad guys and catching speeding cars with school, homework and chores. Then, Mr Stark had been there, offering his support (and by extension, a reluctant Happy), closely followed by Ned, May, and more recently, MJ. Having people in his corner, people he can talk to about all that stuff? It’s nice - even if he does have to be home by eleven on school nights and one at the weekends.

He skips to the next song as he turns onto the side street that’ll allow him to cut out the majority of tourist foot traffic bleeding out from Times Square. It’s much quieter going this way, and he lets himself get lost in the beat of the music and the steady warmth of the sunlight filtering down between the buildings as he walks.

He feels it before he hears it.

A sharp pulse in his head, and he’s ripping the headphones out of his ears, every sense on red alert. The van comes tearing up the street behind him, so fast that he feels the vacuum pushing and pulling at his body as it roars past him.

Jesus, they’re going to _kill_ someone, driving like that.

Peter’s hand is already in his rucksack fumbling for the hidden compartment he keeps his suit in, his eyes searching for a quick place to change when he hears the sharp screech of brakes up ahead. The van slams to a halt, and three men in black balaclavas jump out the side door, lunging for a short guy with dark hair walking up ahead.

Peter feels his heart stutter in his chest.

_Oh my god_. He’s watching a kidnapping.

He’s running before he can even think about it, feet pounding against the pavement.

“ _Hey!_ ”

The victim is struggling as they manhandle him toward the van, but it doesn’t last long. One of the men cracks him hard across the cheek and he goes limp, dazed, no longer fighting as they drag him. In that second, Peter catches sight of his face.

It’s Flash Thompson.

_Jesus Christ._

Peter’s almost there, he’s almost - he’s on them, he’s shoving one man to the ground, twisting and swinging his fist at another, he’s grabbing the back of Flash’s shirt, holding him back from being shoved in the van, he’s throwing out a web to stop the guy getting up off the floor, he’s –

\- not wearing his web-shooters.

He’s not in his suit.

The realisation slams into him so hard that he falters, suddenly feeling incredibly small and exposed. And then something else slams into him, a violent impact across his upper back that sends him sprawling to the ground.

It knocks the wind out of him, his palms scrape against the asphalt, but he scrambles to his feet, just managing to block a blow aimed for his face. Flash is now in the van, one of the men is crouched in the opening, yelling to the others.

“Come _on._ ”

The man who’d tried to hit him darts toward the van. Peter grabs for his arm. The other man grabs _him,_ pulling him back and slamming him hard against the side panel, hands twisted in the front of his shirt.

“Who the _fuck_ are you?” he snarls in Peter’s face.

From the van, “Just leave him, Three!”

Peter grips the man’s forearms. Down the street, someone is screaming, running toward them with their phone to their ear. Further back there’s a family of five, the parents clinging to their kids for dear life as they watch on in horror.

It’s just him and the one man outside of the van, now. He knows he’s not going to be able to stop this without making it obvious he’s more than an average kid. And he can’t let Flash get taken alone. God knows what these guys want with him.

In a split second, he makes a decision. A stupid decision, really, but the only one that makes sense to him in the moment.

The man thinks Peter is going for his face, but he’s wrong. Instead, his fingers snag on the fabric of the mask, tearing it from the man’s head. As his face is exposed, the man looks startled, then his expression turns livid. And then he’s dragging Peter by his collar to the opening of the van.

Against every instinct he has, Peter doesn’t throw him off, doesn’t resist in the way he knows he can.

“What the hell, Three?!”

“He saw my _face_.”

Peter catches Flash’s terrified expression as he’s thrown in through the side door, then hands are grabbing him, dragging him back. The van is moving before the door is even closed.

“Him first,” the man – _Three -_ says, nodding towards Peter.

_First for what?_ Peter thinks, and then he doesn’t have to wonder.

From behind, a wet cloth is pressed down hard over his face. His eyes water from the fumes. He holds his breath, panicked.

_No, no, no, not this. How is he supposed to -_

One of the guys drives a savage fist into his stomach and he gasps involuntarily, throat burning as the chemicals enter his lungs.

Almost instantly, his head is swimming, and after that, he’s too slow to remember that he shouldn’t take the next breath, or the next.

By the fourth, he’s already gone.

 

* * *

 

 

Surprisingly, he’s not the first to wake.

The first thing he notices is the disgusting taste in his mouth, and that his head feels like a bowling ball perched on his neck. The second is –

“Parker.”

\- that his shoulders ache. He’s slumped forward in a chair, arms bound individually to the slats on the back with what feels like zip-ties. His ankles are bound similarly to the chair’s legs.

_“Parker!”_

Slowly, he lifts his head, blinking blearily in the direction the voice had come from. Flash Thompson is sitting across from him, tied to a chair in the same way that Peter is. He looks a little dishevelled; a little scared, but he doesn’t seem to have any injuries save for the pretty impressive shiner steadily darkening his left eye.

“Oh my god,” he says shakily as Peter focuses on him, “I thought you died.”

Peter sits up with a groan, trying to roll his stiff shoulders as his eyes sweep the room they’re in. It’s underground, he thinks, taking in the high, small windows and the cool, slightly damp quality to the air. It looks like it might have been used for storage at one time, but the empty shelf stacks and the aged sheets of paper sporadically littering the floor suggest it hasn’t been used in some time.

He exhales hard.

_Okay, creepy lair – check._

If he focuses his hearing he can pick up voices, coming from the other side of the door behind Flash – three, no, four guys, the ones from the van plus the driver, he guesses - but his head is too foggy to pick up what they’re saying.

He looks back to Flash. “Are you okay?” he asks hoarsely. His throat is still raw from the chemicals.

Flash stares at him like he’s lost his mind. “ _Am I_ \- ? No. No, I’m not okay. I am so far from okay. I don’t even know what’s going on.”

“They didn’t say what they want?”

Flash shoots a quick look over his shoulder.

“They haven’t said anything to me,” he says quietly. “But… I think I heard them talking about my dad.”

It occurs to Peter then, that he doesn’t actually know anything about Flash’s parents. He knows that Flash’s dad is rich - if the car he crashed on Homecoming night and the new sneakers and branded clothes Flash is always turning up to school with are anything to go by - but past that, he doesn’t know much about them.

“They probably want money,” Flash continues. “This - this kind of thing is usually about money, right? I mean – not that this has ever happened to me before, but in the movies it’s always - _hey_. Hey, hey, hey, no - no, don’t - don’t go back to sleep, Parker. _Please._ ”

“I’m not,” Peter says, opening his eyes to a squint. “I’m not. Just – my head hurts.”

It’s the aftereffects of whatever shit was on that cloth, clinging to his brain, making him fuzzy, making the light hurt his eyes. He knows it’ll pass pretty quickly, but right now it feels like he’s being punched in the head with every beat of his heart.

“Yeah, probably because they drugged the _shit_ out of you,” Flash says. “Seriously, how are you even awake right now?”

Peter just shrugs.

“What about you?”

“What _about_ me?”

“They didn’t drug you, too?”

“No, I -” Flash starts, but then his mouth snaps shut. He looks away, and perhaps he’s imagining it, but Peter thinks he almost looks… guilty. “I mean – they said if I didn’t…”

Peter understands - It’s not hard to connect the dots. They’d given Flash a choice: sit down and shut up or go down the same way Peter had. He’d been scared; he’d gone with option one.

Flash scowls, face flushing. “Don’t look at me like that. Maybe you would’ve been okay too if you hadn’t tried to go all Kingsman on their asses,” he says. “What the hell were you doing anyway, huh, Parker? Trying to be a hero? You think your buddy _Iron Man_ was gonna hear about it and ask you join the Avengers?” He scoffs. “Please.”  

And with that Peter feels his sympathy waning. The bitter urge to laugh rises up in his chest.

“I was trying to help you,” he says, stiffly.

“Yeah? And how are you _helping_?”

It catches Peter off guard. How _is_ he helping? He’s at the point now where he has to admit he didn’t exactly think this through. Short of _don’t let Flash get taken alone_ there hadn’t really been much of a plan. _Get out of here_ is now the obvious one, but how to go about it is where he’s tripping up.

The restraints are laughable, and fighting four on one isn’t really a problem, either, but he can’t do any of that without Flash seeing, and he’s just not sure he wants the asshole who coined the nickname _Penis Parker_ in his inner circle. Scratch that – he definitely doesn’t.

But he feels his stomach swoop at the realisation that he might not have a choice.

“Yeah. Exactly,” Flash says to Peter’s lack of response, but Peter is no longer listening, attention suddenly focused outside the four walls of the room. “Honestly, you think you’re so-”

“Stop. Stop talking,” Peter says quickly.

Flash frowns, annoyed. “You -,” he starts angrily, but he cuts off, flinching at the heavy clank that echoes through the room, his expression instantly dropping into one of fear.

The door swings open, and the four men come trotting down the steps into the room, one after another. Their faces are still covered with the ski masks.

“Thompson,” one of them says, planting his feet in front of Flash as the others spread out, circling the room like sharks.

One man loops round behind Peter before leaning up against the wall, just on the edge of his peripheral vision. Peter flicks his eyes to him quickly, the hair on the back of his neck prickling when he sees the man is already looking at him. He knows it’s the one they’d called Three. The one whose mask he’d taken.

Three smiles. It’s not a nice smile, and Peter’s mouth goes dry, pulse jumping.

“Seems we have a problem,” the first guy – _the leader,_ Peter thinks - is saying to Flash. His tone is casual, but there’s an undercurrent that Peter doesn’t miss. Flash doesn’t seem to either, if his face is anything to go by.

“Daddy dearest doesn’t want to pay up,” interjects another, from his perch on the rickety-looking table to Peter’s left.

So this _is_ about money.

“Wh – what?” Flash whispers, glancing between the two of them. He shakes his head. “No, I – h-he will. He will, just – just let me talk to him. Just let me –”

“Quiet,” the man says, and Flash’s jaw snaps shut.

Dread curls in Peter’s stomach. His heart thumps hard against his ribs. He flexes his wrists against the zip ties.

“Here is your problem, Mr Thompson: me and my guys, here – we got families; people we gotta provide for. Your _pops_ made it so we couldn’t do that – shut down our business, left us without jobs. The way we see it, he owes us a debt. You understand.”

“Y – yes, sir,” Flash says quickly, “I’m sorry about your jobs, I’m sorry -”

“And if Daddy doesn’t want to pay – well, that leaves us with an issue. Where are we getting the money?”

“I –”

The fourth guy, who’d been hovering by the stairs groans, linking his fingers together and bringing his arms up above his head, stretching, like he’s bored. “I think maybe _dad_ needs a little motivation,” he says.

The other guy jumps down from the table. “Couldn’t have said it better myself, Four.”

Peter can see in Flash’s face that he now understands fully. Flash shrinks back in the chair, face paling.

Peter’s chest constricts, his breathing coming fast. He doesn’t have a choice, now. He’s actually doing this. _Oh Christ_. He tenses, adrenaline rushing through his limbs. Four and the leader step forward, crowding Flash’s space and -

“Peter knows Tony Stark,” Flash blurts out in a rush.

The men stop.

Peter blinks, all intentions swept away by his surprise. “What?”

He’s aware that all eyes have now turned to him, and his stomach seems to shrink in on itself at the hungry looks that are suddenly being directed his way. He can almost _see_ the dollar signs flashing in the kidnappers’ eyes.

He laughs nervously. “No, I -” He gives Flash a pointed look. “No I don’t.”

“Yes he does,” Flash is babbling, eyes jumping from captor to captor desperately, “he does. He’s got this internship. He gets picked up in these fancy town cars all the time. I’ve seen him. And he talks about Tony Stark like he’s his dad or something, he -”

“Flash, shut _up_ ,” Peter hisses, seeing the looks the men are now exchanging, “Shut – _ah!_ ” Peter’s words cut off as a hand slides into his hair and _yanks_ , bending his neck at an uncomfortable angle. He had almost forgotten Three was in the room. He grits his teeth, breathing harshly through his nose.

“Shh, shh, shh,” the man sing-songs into his ear, but it’s the flat of the blade - cold and hard and pressed to Peter’s throat - that keeps him quiet. His pulse flutters against the pressure.

“Your friend was talking,” Three continues, like he’s scolding a child. To Flash he says, “You were saying?”

Flash’s face has gone ashen, eyes wide as he stares at Peter, at the knife.

“I – I don’t – I don’t know.” His voice trembles, thin – barely a whisper.

“You seemed pretty sure just now. Seemed to think _this one_ ,” he punctuates his words with another yank of Peter’s hair, and Peter can’t help the little noise that escapes him as the pain shoots through his scalp, “was somehow important to one of the richest men in the world.”

Flash’s lips are a thin line. His chest twitches with fast, panicked breaths.

“Not feeling so chatty now, huh?”

Peter thinks Flash actually looks like he’s about to be sick.

“And what about you?” Three says, untangling his fingers from Peter’s hair and moving round the chair so he’s standing in front of him. He moves the blade from Peter’s throat to tap lightly against his cheek. “Think Iron Man will pay up to get you back in one piece?”

“Peter Parker,” the guy by the door announces. Peter’s backpack is at his feet, emptied onto the floor. The suit compartment seems to have gone unnoticed, but he’s holding Peter’s wallet in one hand and waving his learner’s permit in the other.

Peter feels his blood run cold. His address is on there. _May’s_ address.

“Well?” The knife rolls up onto its edge along his cheek, then back down flat. “ _Peter Parker_?”

Peter swallows hard, looks Three in the eye. “I just get the coffees,” he says tightly, trying to hide the tremor in his voice. “I’ve never even met him.”

The man holds his gaze for a moment, then he glances over his shoulder at the others. He laughs, short and humourless, and when he turns back to Peter, his eyes are dangerous. The pressure on the knife increases.

“All the coffee runners get chauffeurs, do they?”

_Goddammit, Flash._ Peter shoots him a glance over Three’s arm, seeing that he at least has the decency to look halfway apologetic.

“Nah,” Three continues, “Seems to me there’s a little more going on here. What are you – Stark’s bastard or something? Ha. Wait – this internship a _special_ internship?”

Peter looks back at him sharply, glaring. The man gives him a satisfied smirk, and Peter forces himself to breathe, to stay calm. _Fuck this guy._ He’s not going to give him the satisfaction. He sets his jaw, focusing his gaze straight ahead.

Three scoffs.  “Tough guy, huh?”

He tilts the knife so the point is pressing into the outer corner of Peter’s eye, and Peter freezes, heart pounding painfully in his chest.

“Three,” one of the others says, voice low, a warning.

Three’s cheek twitches.

“It’s okay,” he says quietly to Peter, “We’ll find out soon enough.” And then the knife is gone.

Peter lets out a shaky breath as the man walks away. He relaxes his hands – curled so tightly into fists he’s almost certain he’s punctured skin. This is – this has gone to shit. They know his name; they know where he lives.

He can’t – he can’t do anything now, can he? He thinks about Toomes, in prison, knowing his name, knowing where he goes to school, knowing how to find him, his family. That alone still keeps him awake at night, forget adding these four to the batch.

_Shit,_ he really didn’t think this through.

The men are by the door, engaged in a hushed conversation.

“I’m just saying we should think about this,” Four is saying. “Are we sure we want to get involved with Iron Man?”

“We could be set for life, man. Think about _that._ ”

It’s a short argument, and after a few minutes, the decision is made. Predictably, greed outweighs sense in coming to the outcome, and Peter stiffens as Three approaches him once again.

“Smile,” he says, holding a phone aloft.

Peter, resolutely, does not, and the man drops the phone, sighing.

The tingle at the base of his skull warns him it’s coming, but Peter resists the instinct to flinch. The fist catches him hard across the jaw, snapping his head to the side and sending the chair rocking.

He hears Flash’s sharp intake of breath.

“Stop messing around and take the damn picture,” the leader snaps.

Peter brings his head back up. His lip is throbbing. He can taste blood, feel it dripping down his chin.

“Just speeding up the process. Want to let ole Iron Man know we’re not fooling around,” Three tells his colleagues, raising the phone again. He doesn’t tell Peter to smile this time, but his own face splits into a grin as he takes the picture.

Peter looks away, heat burning his cheeks – shame at the thought of Mr Stark receiving that picture, and anger that he’s let himself end up in this mess, let it go on so long.

“You just earned your old man an extension. Congratulations,” Three says to Flash as he passes him.

Light on their feet at the prospect of becoming rich, the men file out of the door, the heavy clank of the bolt echoing in the silence they leave in their wake.

Peter looks at Flash. Flash looks at Peter.

For a moment, neither of them speak, and then -

“I’m sorry” It explodes out of Flash in a rush. Peter doesn’t think he’s ever seen him so rattled. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know they were gonna do that, I swear. I didn’t know, I didn’t -”

“It’s okay,” Peter says. He twists his neck, wiping the underside of his chin on his shoulder. For just a second, the blood stops dripping down the front of his sweater.

“It’s not okay. This is so far from okay.”

Peter couldn’t agree more. This is _fucked,_ is what it is.

He can hear the men, just on the other side of the door. They’re clapping each other on the back, excited. Talking about what they’re going to do with Mr Stark’s millions.

_God._

Peter feels like an idiot. He jumped without looking and it’s only now, sitting here, that the myriad of other things he could have done are crossing his mind. Why didn’t he hang back – send droney after the van and follow straight after as Spider-man? Why didn’t he at least take a moment to throw his mask on before rushing in? He could have stopped this in the street before it even started.

The simple answer is that he has a habit of running headfirst into things without considering all the options – something that Mr Stark is on his back about constantly, and something Peter had thought he was getting better at.

Apparently not.

He’d seen someone in trouble and he’d just reacted – not the worst character trait for a superhero, but Peter has to admit it definitely wasn’t the smartest move, given where he finds himself now.

Now it seems he’s got two choices - neither of which is particularly appealing: bust out of here - and he doesn’t see any way of doing that without bringing Flash in on the Spider-man situation – or sit and wait for Tony Stark to get that picture and come to the rescue, which just - no.

His stomach churns with indecision.

“What’s the chances Iron Man’s gonna come?” Flash asks quietly after a few minutes.

_Pretty high, if he gets that picture,_ Peter thinks. He huffs a dry laugh. “Thought you didn’t believe me.”

He only feels a little guilty about the flicker of vindication he feels as Flash’s face goes pink.

A sudden exclamation from the other side of the door catches his attention. Someone starts laughing.

_“Well what do you know? Looks like Thompson had a change of heart.”_

_“Shit! The whole lot?”_

_“The whole lot, man.”_

_“The routing numbers good?”_

_“What do you take me for? It’s good.”_

A beat of silence, and then a long, drawn-out sigh.

A voice. The guy who’d been sitting on the table.

_“I’ll do it.”_

A series of sounds follow – the sound of someone standing, followed by a metallic _click-scrape-click._ It takes a second for Peter to recognise the noise, and when he does, his entire body flushes cold. His heart starts to beat fast, equal parts fear and anticipation, because he’s gotta move. _Now._ Indecision is no longer an option.

“What,” Flash breathes, “what’s wrong?”

Peter snaps his eyes to Flash, and god knows what his face looks like because when he does, Flash goes pale.

“Flash,” it comes out as a croak, his throat suddenly dry. He’s already stretching his hands across the back of the chair, hooking his fingers between zip tie and skin and giving twin sharp tugs. “I’m trusting you, here.”

Flash frowns, confused, but his face goes blank as Peter brings his hands forward and leans down to snap the ties around his ankles. “What…”

But Peter is jumping up, diving forward and skidding to his knees by his backpack, still on the floor where Four had tossed it. He can hear the footsteps approaching. His hands shake as he fumbles for the release on the suit compartment.

“Parker! Parker, stop!” Flash hisses, “ _What are you doing?_ Are you trying to get us killed?”

_There._ His web-shooters. It’s all he has time for. The second they touch the skin of his wrist, they expand, mechanisms whirring as the straps circle his arm.

Flash is watching, and Peter sees the flicker of recognition in his eyes - the moment confusion turns to realisation.

“Oh you have _got_ to be shitting me. _You_?!”

“Don’t give me away,” Peter says quickly, and then the bolt is sliding on the door and Peter is flinging himself to the ceiling. Flash makes a little choked noise, but fixes his eyes straight ahead as the man enters the room.

There’s a gun in his hand.

“Good news, Thompson,” he’s saying, as he skips down the steps. “Daddy made good on the money. Time to go.”

But Peter knows they have no intention of taking him anywhere. Flash flicks his eyes quickly up to Peter’s and Peter sees that he knows it too.

The man looks up as he hits the bottom step, and freezes.

“What the fuck?” he says, striding forward, taking in Peter’s empty chair, the broken zip ties littering the floor. He raises the gun towards the shelf stacks, then he whirls on Flash, gun levelled at his head. “Where is he?”

Flash tenses, and Peter drops.

Two feet connecting solidly with the man’s upper back has him collapsing forward and hitting the ground hard, chin clacking against the stone floor as the gun goes skittering away. He doesn’t get up.

“Is he… dead?”

“No,” Peter says, firing a quick burst of webbing to make sure the man stays down. He tilts his head, listening for any sound that the scuffle had alerted the others, trying to focus past the violent pounding of his own heart in his ears. He doesn’t think they’ve noticed.

Flash’s face is blank as he says, “he was going to kill me.”

“We gotta go,” Peter says, making quick work of Flash’s bindings. Flash stands, shakily, looks to Peter.

“Stay behind me,” Peter says, and Flash nods, the motion jerky.

He takes a step towards the door, but then suddenly there’s shouting coming from the other room. Peter freezes, feels Flash do the same behind him. He can hear the sound of a fight. There’s a gunshot, and then someone is running in their direction.

“Shit.”

Peter shoves Flash backwards. Towards the shelf stacks. “Go. _Go_.” It’s minimal cover, but it’s better than nothing.

Flash bolts, and as he does, he stumbles, foot sliding on an old sheet of paper.

He crashes to his knees with a gasp. Peter lunges to pull him up. Then Three is standing in the doorway, eyes burning with fury and fixed on Peter. He isn’t wearing his ski mask, and there’s a small cut above his eyebrow dripping blood down his face.

“You little prick,” he seethes, rushing forward and raising his gun. Peter straightens, moving so he’s in front of Flash, breaths coming quick. “You’re fucking dead.”

He’s aiming dead centre for Peter’s chest.

And then he’s flying into the room in a flash of white-blue light.

He crashes to the floor at Peter’s feet and doesn’t move, smoke rising from the burning hole in the back of his jacket.

“We really have to work on your sense of self-preservation, kid,” the metallic voice of Tony Stark says as Iron Man steps into the room.

Peter exhales hard - a breathy kind of laugh that sounds more like a sob.

“You two okay?” Mr Stark asks, flipping up the faceplate and revealing he’s actually here. He’s looking pointedly at Peter’s face, at the blood on his sweater.

Peter nods. “Yeah,” he says, as Flash says “Yes, Mr Iron Man - sir.”

Tony glances to Flash, then back to Peter.

“Friend of yours?” he asks, quirking a brow.

Peter looks at Flash, and Flash gives him a small smile.

“Yeah,” Peter says, “something like that.”

And weirdly, it feels true.

 

* * *

 

Tony stays with them until just before the cops come, which doesn’t take too long, seeing as the broad-daylight kidnapping in midtown is all New York’s finest has been focused on since it happened. He takes Peter’s suit and web-shooters with him – just to be on the safe side.

When the cops arrive, the story is clear – Spider-man saved them. The four kidnappers webbed to various walls and floors around the building is enough to put any doubts about that narrative to rest, and Peter and Flash are loaded into the back of a car and driven to the local station to give statements and get picked up by their guardians.

“I won’t tell,” Flash murmurs quietly as they pull into the parking lot, “even if you did wreck my dad’s car.”

Peter laughs.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> God, guys. I really am so sorry that this took so long, but as you can see - it's nearly 5000 words and completely ran away from me! I wrote most of it, decided I hated it, deleted stuff, wrote stuff, changed stuff... basically I've read this so many times now I can't even tell if it's good or not, but I desperately wanted to have something to give you guys.
> 
> I was completely blown away by the response I received for the last chapter I posted, so I just want to say thank you for that. It really made me smile!
> 
> As always, please leave me a comment and let me know what you think - particularly with this one, as I'm really not sure on it.
> 
> Love you all!! x


	8. Fever

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I kind of envisioned this as a follow up to Chapter One: Stabbed, but it can be read on its own too.

 

“Honey?”

The voice is soft; as gentle as the hand enveloping his.

There’s something on his face.

The steady hum of machines drifts to his ears.

“Peter, baby, are you with us?”

 _Mom,_ he thinks, rolling his face towards the voice.

His eyes are slow to open, lids weighed down and heavy, but when he finally pries them apart, she’s there. There are dark circles under her eyes, and her hair is limp and flat around her face, but when his eyes meet hers, she smiles.

“Oh thank God,” May breathes. Her hand squeezes his, but the sensation barely registers. His hand feels disconnected from his body. His _body_ feels disconnected from his body, all floaty and warm.

His lips part, and he wants to say _what happened?,_ or maybe _where am I?,_ but his mouth is full of cotton and his tongue is thick and heavy. He blinks, and then it is not just May in the room with him, but Mr Stark, too, and a pretty woman with dark hair, who is looking at him with kind eyes.

They’re all looking at him, actually. Patient. Expecting.

“What?” It sounds like it floats up out of him in a bubble – hardly a word at all – and the sound makes him want to laugh.

The pretty woman’s eyes crinkle as she says, “I asked if you were feeling any pain, Peter?”

_Pain?_

He frowns.

“No?”

Should he be?

If anything he feels really, really good. Like his body is wrapped in a big warm blanket. And the blanket is made from a cloud.

The woman nods as she makes a note on her clipboard.

“That’s good,” she says, giving him a warm smile, then she turns to Tony and continues, “We’ll need to keep an eye on him – the dosage he’s on should be enough to mitigate any discomfort for now, but I can’t guarantee…”

Whatever they are talking about sounds important, but as soon as he is no longer being spoken to directly, Peter’s finds his attention wilting. Trying to focus is like trying to catch smoke. He hears words like _metabolism_ and _enzymes,_ but it’s the quiet ones spoken next to him that break through the fog.

“You’re gonna be okay, honey.”

A hand brushes across his forehead, light fingers carding gently through his hair, and he leans into it, sighing.

He wonders absently what’s wrong with him, for May to be saying that, but his eyes are slipping closed again - his floaty body suddenly heavy and drawing him down down down into the mattress.

He’ll figure it out later.

The sounds around him mute out, and he drifts.

Sensations come and go, touching at the edge of his consciousness like waves lapping at a shoreline - a hand on his face, a gentle pressure on his side, the squeak of a rubber sole on linoleum – enough to draw him up into the waking world for a moment, and too fleeting to keep him tethered to it.

When he finally wakes fully, it is nowhere near as blissful as the first time.

For one, his head is a lot clearer; for another, he now understands why the pretty lady was asking him about pain.

It’s there, radiating out in dull pulses from his side and settled deep within his bones. His limbs ache. His head aches. He kind of feels like he got into a fight with the Hulk and lost.

Wait, he didn’t, did he?

His fingers ghost along his side, feeling the thick padding of gauze secured there, under the curve of his ribs and -

 _Stabbed,_ his brain supplies. He cringes as the memories rush back. God, no wonder May looked so worried.

The room he’s in is dark now – it must be night - but even without light Peter’s eyes are sharp. Now that he is more alert, he is cognizant enough to connect the sight of the machines surrounding his bed and the clean, sterile smell in the air with the word ‘hospital’ – although this is nicer than any he can remember being in before. He thinks he must be in the compound. In the medical bay.

There’s a sofa against the opposite wall, and on that sofa: a body, chest rising and falling slowly in sleep. It’s Mr Stark. May isn’t here, but Peter knows she won’t have gone far.

A sudden shiver runs through him, goosebumps prickling along his bare arms where they lie atop the thin sheet that covers him. They must have the A.C on, though _why_ in the fall he has no idea. Maybe it’s a hospital thing?

He draws his hands in under the covers, mindful of the wires and tubes snaking off his body, but even after a few minutes of clutching them to his chest he doesn’t feel any warmer.

He can feel the weight of a spare blanket folded over his feet, but his discomfort isn’t yet outweighing his unwillingness to move, so he spends a little more time shivering under the sheet until eventually he accepts that he isn’t going to be able to get warm without it. Begrudgingly, stiffly, he leans forward to grab for the blanket, and _gasps_.

He shouldn’t have moved. _Jesus_ , he shouldn’t have moved. Pain - sharp and electric - cuts through his wound, through his chest, and he collapses back against the mattress, clutching his side. Through the white noise in his ears he hears small, whimpering sounds, and it takes a second to realise they’re coming from him.

A light clicks on.

“Pete?” Mr Stark’s voice is gravelly with sleep. Then it is suddenly sharper, and closer. “What happened? What’s wrong?”

He wants to reply, but it’s taking all he has to breathe without screaming. He focuses on that instead, on the little puffs of air blown in and out between clenched teeth. His eyes are squeezed shut. He can feel little beads of sweat prickling across his forehead.

“F.R.I, get Cho in here, now.”

 _No,_ Peter wants to say, _It’s okay. I’m okay,_ but it isn’t and he _certainly_ isn’t. Did it hurt this much when the knife went in? He can’t remember. If it did, shock is a much better painkiller than whatever is in his system right now.

“Kid, you gotta breathe,” Mr Stark is saying. His hand is on Peter’s shoulder, warm and firm.

“Trying,” Peter grinds out, pushing his head back into the pillow and attempting to focus on the cool flow of oxygen from the cannula under his nose instead of the sharp discomfort in his chest every time his lungs expand. It’s not particularly effective. “Ow.”

“ _Ow_ is about right. Really did a number on yourself this time, bud.”

“Technically… it was… the guy with… the knife,” Peter says between pants, but the attempt at humour falls flat when he gasps at a particularly horrible throb in his side. Mr Stark’s hand tightens on his shoulder, and his face when the pain lets up enough for Peter to open his eyes is decidedly unamused, mouth set in a thin line and eyes concerned.

“I’m fine,” Peter tells him, even though the tightness in his voice is evident, “really.” It’s not a total lie. The pain is slowly easing off more and more the longer he holds himself perfectly still. And doesn’t breathe. So it’s all good. Sort of.

Mr Stark looks unconvinced. “Yeah. Forgive me for wanting a second opinion on that. You know, from someone who actually has an M.D.”

Almost as soon as he says it, the door opens and the woman from last time Peter had been awake is slipping into the room, hastily fastening her hair into a ponytail. He catches a glimpse of slippers and pyjama pants under her white coat and feels a twinge of guilt for being the reason she’s been pulled out of bed.

“’bout time, doc,” Mr Stark says wryly.

The doctor, who Peter assumes must be the ‘Cho’ that Mr Stark asked F.R.I.D.A.Y to alert, simply flashes Mr Stark a look before asking, “What happened?”

“Your calculations were way off is what happened. Look at him.”

Doctor Cho doesn’t look happy at Mr Stark’s tone, but she does look to Peter, eyes softening as she takes in what must be his horrible appearance if the way he feels is at all reflected in the way he looks.

“It’s okay,” Peter says weakly.

“It’s not,” Mr Stark counters, fixing him with a stern look. He turns to Cho. “He shouldn’t be in this much pain already.”

Dr Cho exhales hard. She looks tired. “I’m working with one hand tied behind my back here, Tony. If you’d given me a heads up, I could have started to synthesise a painkiller that would work with his biology instead of having to guess and make do with Rogers’ supply.”

“You’re right. Next time the kid plans on getting himself stabbed, I’ll be sure to give you notice.”

“That’s not what I meant and you know it,” Cho says sharply, as she moves to Peter’s bedside. She gently pries his hands away from his side, _tsk_ ing as she inspects the dressing there and sees the spots of blood soaked through. Softer, now her attention is directed toward him, she asks, “How are you feeling, Peter?”

“You say _fine_ again, kid, we’re gonna have words,” Mr Stark says, letting his hand fall from Peter’s shoulder and stepping away to give Doctor Cho space to work. Peter finds he can’t muster the energy to scowl at him, though he wants to. The pain is dwindling back to that persistent dull ache, and the fading adrenaline has left him feeling wrung-out and a little lightheaded. That coldness he’d felt has also returned tenfold – exuberated by the thin layer of sweat now covering his body.

He shivers.

“Sore,” he answers honestly, resisting the urge to stick his tongue out at Mr Stark.

“Well, the glue is still holding, which is something, I suppose,” Doctor Cho says as she fetches a new dressing from the set of drawers next to Peter’s head. “Mind telling me why you thought moving was a good idea?”

“I was… Hang on, you _glued_ me back together?” He follows his question with a glance down at his side and immediately wishes he hadn’t because, _gross_.

Doctor Cho laughs a little. “I assure you stitches wouldn’t be any fun at the rate you heal. It’ll dissolve, don’t worry.” She carefully applies the new dressing, and her voice turns serious as she says, “Now, I can’t stress enough how important it is that you move as little as possible, okay? Your rate of healing is incredible, but you’ve had a serious injury, and your body needs time to repair itself.”

“Okay, sorry,” Peter says, feeling his cheeks warming under her gaze. “I just… I was just trying to get the blanket.”

He sees Mr Stark’s head snap up at that, eyes fixing on Peter. “You better be joking,” Mr Stark says. “All this ‘cause you wanted a blanket?”

Peter grimaces.

“Kid, you think I’m sleeping on the couch because it works wonders for my spine? You need something, _ask_. Jesus.”

“Sorry,” Peter mumbles. Then he smiles slightly. “Can you pass me the blanket?”

Mr Stark’s jaw twitches, like he’s trying incredibly hard not to give in to the urge to grin back as he rolls his eyes with a long-suffering sigh and reaches for the blanket. “You’re lucky I like you,” he grumbles, then frowns when Doctor Cho taps her hand to his arm, stilling his hand. “What?”

“Wait a moment,” she says. Then to Peter: “you’re cold?”

“A bit, yeah.” As if to validate his response, another shiver chases up his spine, and he winces as the movement jostles his injury. “’m cold a lot though.”

“Still not convinced he didn’t get bitten by a lizard,” Tony says, flicking his finger against Peter’s ankle.

Peter pulls his foot away with a breathy laugh. “Yeah… Lizard-man doesn’t really have the same ring to it. Plus, y’know, I’ve actually fought a lizard man. The spider aesthetic is way cooler.”

Mr Stark snorts at that, but Doctor Cho’s face remains serious. “What’s the temperature in here?” she asks Tony.

Mr Stark glances to the ceiling. “F.R.I.D.A.Y?”

“Temperature is a comfortable seventy-one degrees.”

Now Doctor Cho is the one to frown.

“Hmm.”

She pulls another item out of the drawers, which Peter recognises immediately as a thermometer – one of those fancy digital ones. He lies dutifully still as it’s pressed into his ear, which feels super weird, and waits for the beep. When it comes, Doctor Cho _hmms_ again.

“What?” ask Peter and Tony at the same time.

“One-oh-one point six,” Doctor Cho says, wrinkling her nose. “That’s higher than I’m comfortable with. Explains the chills, though. Do you usually run hot, Peter?”

“Um,” Peter starts, realising that he doesn’t actually know. After the bite he’d been too caught up figuring out what he could _do_ rather than analysing how his body had changed (besides the obvious, of course - hello unearned abs!). He probably should have paid more attention.

“Sits around one-hundred, normally,” Mr Stark says to Peter’s complete surprise. He just shrugs when he sees Peter’s shocked face.

 _How the -? Oh. The suit._ He’s going to have to ask Mr Stark about that later.

Doctor Cho’s mouth twists to the side as she picks up her tablet, her brows furrowing as she begins tapping at the screen. Peter and Tony exchange a look, then Tony steps forward, arms crossed.

“Care to share with the class, Doc?”

Doctor Cho glances up. “What? Oh. Nothing to worry about,” she assures. She catches Peter’s eye and gives him a small smile. “Given your elevated normal temperature, I’m going to class this as a mild fever, but that doesn’t mean it’s not something I want to keep an eye on.”

“So I… can’t have the blanket?” Peter asks, surpressing another shudder. He isn’t an idiot, he knows how fevers work, but try explaining it to his achy shivery body that just really, really wants to be warm.

Cho shoots him a sympathetic look. A clear _no_ if he ever saw one. He looks to Mr Stark with the faint hope that he’ll take pity on him and overrule her decision, but the man’s attention isn’t directed toward him, it’s directed toward Cho, and he’s frowning.

“That doesn’t sound like nothing to worry about,” Mr Stark says.

Doctor Cho tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. “Low-grade fever is incredibly common post-surgery, Tony. I wouldn’t usually expect to see it this soon, but I’m taking it as a sign that Peter’s healing factor is doing its job. We’ll keep an eye on him, make sure the fever doesn’t spike, but I’m confident it’ll resolve itself.” To Peter, she says, “Usually I would recommend something like Tylenol in the meanwhile, but…” She trails off, looking apologetic.

_But he’d need about four bottles of the stuff to even make a dent._

“’s okay,” Peter says, stifling a yawn that had come out of nowhere. “I get it.”

“I _am_ going to switch out your pain meds, though. I’m afraid it’s not going to help much, but it should at least take the edge off.”

“Thanks,” Peter murmurs, forcing himself to blink against the suddenly heavy weight of his eyelids.

Mr Stark seems to notice. “Sleep, kid,” he says, patting Peter’s leg. “I’m not going anywhere.”

Doctor Cho is fiddling with the I.V. stand, and Peter can tell the second the new drugs are hooked up – a light sensation of warmth and lethargy flooding his body.

“’kay,” he mumbles, feeling his eyes start to slip closed. With a jolt, he snaps them open again. “Wait.” He catches Mr Stark’s eye. “May?”

“Next door. Sleeping. We’re taking turns spidey-sitting. You want me to get her?”

“No,” Peter says, letting his head relax into the pillow. “No, ‘s fine. Don’t want her to worry.” He’s put her through so much recently. She deserves some rest.

“Moms always worry,” Doctor Cho says, voice warm.

Peter, sinking into sleep, doesn’t correct her.

Tony doesn’t either.

Just before Peter slips under, ever so quietly, and with a hint of a smile in her voice, he could swear he hears her add a knowing, “Dads, too.”

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Crawls out from under a rock* My lovelies! I'm so sorry this took so long. I never meant to abandon it and never wanted to leave you hanging. Things happened with life, though I have no real excuse. I fully intend to keep going with this work, though I can't make any promises on a timeframe for updates. I want you all to know that reading through your wonderful comments is what gave me the push to finish writing this chapter. I wish it was more given the wait, but I hope you all like it all the same.
> 
> As always, please let me know what you think <3


	9. Stranded

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I recently tripped and fell in love with Spideytorch, so you can thank those dorks for inspiring this chapter. For anyone not familiar with the comics, Johnny and Peter are the same age, and I'm carrying that through into the MCU.

 

_Buzz buzz_

 

 

_Buzz buzz_

 

 

“Boss.”

Tony jerks upright, bleary eyed and groggy. He blinks against the light of the screen in front of him, at the schematics for Rhodey’s new leg braces still hovering three-dimensionally and glowing a soft blue above the desk. There’s a post-it stuck to his forehead and he brushes it off with a huff of annoyance.

Shit. Did he fall asleep?

He scrubs a hand over his face. Groans. Glances up to the ceiling.

“What?”

 

 

_Buzz buzz_

 

 

Oh. That.

He sighs.

“Patch it through, F.R.I.,” he says dropping his head into his hands and rubbing at his eyes. He’s gotta stop doing this – pulling days awake working on projects while Pepper’s away. He always ends up burning out and crashing somewhere stupid and it’s doing nothing for his neck or his mood.

He hears the short trill signalling that the call has been transferred to the speakers, clears his throat and answers, “Stark.”

“Hello?” the voice is a little hesitant, but Tony recognises it straight away. “Tony? It’s May. May Parker. I’m, uh – I’m sorry to call so late. You weren’t sleeping, were you?”

Is it late? He checks the clock. _12:03_ \- practically midday for him given the way he’s messed up his sleep schedule as of late, but he supposes it _is_ past what could constitute a reasonable hour for someone who _doesn’t_ stay awake for seventy-two hours at a time and only sleep whenever their body finally gives up.

“Who, me?” he asks with a short laugh. “Never. What can I do for you? Spider-kid causing you problems?”

There’s a beat of silence, then a shaky exhale on the other end of the line. “Oh. He’s not…he’s not with you, then?”

Tony feels a stab of worry pass through him, chasing away any of the lingering drowsiness.

“No,” he says, suddenly alert. Tense. With a quick flick of his wrist, he swipes the designs for the braces off the screen and starts pulling up the stats feeding from the spider-suit, the kid’s vitals in real time, even though he knows he would have been notified if any of them had reached critical. “He isn’t.”

“Okay,” May is saying. “Okay,” like she’s trying to stave off panic. “I just – you know how he is. I figured he’d just lost track of time, and I’m trying to give him space and trust him, but he should have been home an hour ago now, and I tried calling his cell but it went straight to voicemail and I -”

She breaks off, and he can hear her forcing herself to breathe, to try and stay calm. He can tell it’s taking everything she has to not freak out.

“May, listen,” he starts. He’s never really been that good at consoling people – he’s more the type to jump into action. Find the problem. Find the solution. Fix it. That’s the way he does things. It’s the way he’s gearing up to fix _this_ thing, whatever this thing is, but then the vitals from the suit ping through - all completely normal, save for temperature, which seems to be a little low – and Tony finds himself taking a deep breath, too.

“He’s fine,” he says. A little sharply, because although he’s relieved this is nothing serious, what the _hell_ is the kid doing out an hour past curfew and scaring his aunt half to death if he’s not lying in a ditch somewhere? “He’s fine. I’ve got all the info from the suit in front of me. No injuries. No red flags.”

“Oh thank God.” May’s voice is weak. Strained. “I was so worried. I thought…”

She thought her kid had been stabbed again. Or worse.

“You’re sure?” she asks.

“I’m sure. Like you said – probably just lost track of time rescuing little old ladies from trees or helping kittens cross the road or whatever he’s up to these days,” Tony says.

“Yeah, probably.” May laughs quietly, but the sound is flat. “Can you, uh… can you get him to come home? Please. You can get in contact with the suit, right?”

“I’m on it. He’ll be back before the clock strikes twelve. Er… figuratively speaking. I’ll keep you updated.”

“Tony – thank you.”

“Any time,” he says. “You know that.”

As soon as the call has ended, he makes another, directly to the suit. He’s of half a mind to pull up the kid’s location remotely, but ultimately decides against it. Peter’s never going to learn if Tony doesn’t stop micromanaging his every move. He’s never going to be better than them all if he isn’t given the chance.

The line rings twice through the speakers before it cuts off.

Frowning, Tony tries again. This time, the call disconnects after one ring. Tony stares at the device in his hand.

“Did he -”

_Did the little shit just hang up on him?_

Feeling a bubble of irritation swelling in his chest, he tweaks the controls on the suit, manually overriding the connection and forcing the call through.

_So much for not micromanaging_.

The line connects to a frantic hushed litany of, “No, no, don’t-“ which quickly transitions into a rather sheepish, “Oh. Uh… hey Mr Stark.”

“Hi, kid,” Tony says evenly. He leans back in his chair, tossing the ball of rubber bands he’s snagged off the desk from one hand to the other and back again. “How’s it swinging?”

“Um…It’s… uh, fine,” Peter says, sounding a little distracted in a way that reminds Tony none-too-fondly of another phone call they’d had about ten minutes before he’d had to weld two halves of a ferry back together. “Standard stuff, y’know? Oh look! Some guy’s trying to…steal. A car. So I better…”

“Oh sure,” Tony says with an air of casualness, despite the curious suspicion beginning to manifest itself, “don’t let me keep you. I’ll just let your aunt know what the hold-up is so she stops wearing down the floorboards, shall I?”

There’s a pause, then a softly exhaled, “shit.”

“Yeah.”

“I thought she was working tonight.”

“Obviously she isn’t.”

Peter curses again. “Okay, um- okay, my phone died. Can you tell her I’m staying at the penthouse tonight?”

Tony’s hands still. “Pete. You need me to remind you how fragile your aunt’s faith in me is? You really want me to call and lie to her?”

A beat of silence.

“No, I guess not.”

“Right answer.”

Peter doesn’t say anything to that. And he continues to say nothing.

The silence drags on. All Tony can hear is a quiet _whish-whoosh_ noise in the background of the call. Wind, or waves, or something. It sounds like the kid’s high up, wherever he is, but that’s nothing out of the ordinary.

“So,” Tony prods eventually. “You want to tell me what’s going on?”

“Er… not really, no.”

Tony exhales hard through his nose. Takes a deep breath. “Okay,” he says slowly. “Are you hurt?”

“No.”

Okay, good. He knew that already, but it’s still a weight off his mind to have the kid confirm it.

“You in trouble?”

Peter laughs at that. “Depends what you mean.”

Tony resists the urge to bang his head off the desk. _How wonderfully cryptic_. He’s in dire need of some caffeine if this is what he’s going to be dealing with today - doesn’t even matter if it’s technically the middle of the night. He rubs his eyes.

“Kid, c’mon, throw me a bone, here,” he says, weary. “‘Cause I’m struggling to figure out what’s so important it’s got you skipping out on curfew. Where are you?”

“Um…,” Peter starts. Then, “Wait, you’re not tracking me already?”

“I thought I’d call and give you the chance to tell me what’s going on - y’know, like a normal person – but I’m not above it, so...”

Peter snorts.

“Okay,” he says after a moment’s hesitation, clearly realising he’s been snookered. “But don’t – don’t freak out, okay? I’m, er, I’m on Liberty Island.”

“ _Liberty -_ ” What the hell is the kid doing on Liberty Island? As a native New Yorker it’s just about the last place Tony would have expected Peter to go. He’s sure the kid even made a joke about it once – something about having _some_ semblance of self-respect, or something. “What the hell are you doing on Liberty Island?”

His question is met with silence. Then, a reluctant, “… stuff?”

Tony pinches the bridge of his nose. He’s been awake all of five minutes and he’s pretty sure he’s already got a headache coming on.

“You know what? Fine. Don’t tell me. Just – get yourself home. Your aunt is worried.”

“Yeah… about that.”

Tony stills.

“What?”

There’s a breathy sort-of laugh on the other end of the line, and Peter says, “Well, I kinda missed the last ferry.”

Yep, Tony’s definitely getting a headache.

“So when you say you’re on Liberty Island,” he says slowly, “what you mean to say is that you’re _stranded_ on Liberty Island?”

Peter takes a breath. “Mm, little bit.”

“Okay,” Tony says, flat. “Right.”

“I mean, I did think about trying to make a raft or something out of web fluid, but -”

“No!” Tony interrupts. Christ, this kid is going to give him a fucking coronary. “No. Absolutely not. No web experiments in the bay. Just – stay where you are, okay? I’m coming to get you.”

Peter’s words tumble out in a rush. “Mr Stark, you don’t have to -”

“No?” Tony says, sharper than he means to. “What was your plan? Crash there for the night and hope you don’t freeze to death?”

He can tell he’s hit the nail on the head by the resounding silence that follows.

“…no?”

Tony rolls his eyes heavenward, like someone up there’s going to help him with this absolute disaster of a kid. He sighs. Shakes his head.

“I’ll be there in ten.”

Peter starts to protest again, but Tony’s already ending the call and readying a suit and he’s completely unhappy about the whole thing. Peter’s become many unspoken things to Tony over the last two years, and Tony’s not oblivious to the fact that he’s become many things to Peter, too. He just never imagined taxi driver would be one of them.

He takes a dive off the landing pad and blasts the jets, heading out toward the bay. It’s a surprisingly short flight from the upstate facility, but then, with the updates to the propulsion systems he’s been churning out recently, most flights are. The night is clear, with an unusually large  smattering of stars visible for as near as he is to the city, but as he draws closer to the Statue of Liberty the air suddenly becomes cloudy, streaked with what almost looks like airplane trails. If airplanes made ninety degree turns in the space of about two metres, that is.

He’s busy contemplating that when the Heads Up Display picks up the little red and blue figure crouched on top of Lady Liberty’s crown. It gives a wave, and Tony isn’t far enough away that he can’t pick up the guilty hunch of the kid’s shoulders.

Well, Tony thinks, feeling a little of his annoyance dissipate, there’s no doubt that the kid really is well and truly stranded.

His boots touch down with a metallic _thunk-thunk,_ and he retracts his faceplate as Peter pulls off his mask and climbs to his feet, looking incredibly sheepish.

“Someone order an Uber?” Tony says.

Peter’s whole body seems to sag, his face crumpling.

“I’m sorry!” he says. “Really! I just… lost track of time. I didn’t mean-”

Tony holds up a hand. “You’re gonna want to save this for your aunt, kid.”

“Oh god,” Peter groans. “She’s really mad?” He grimaces. “Of course she’s mad. Oh, man.”

“She’s just worried, Pete. Can’t say I blame her,” Tony says, glancing around. There is literally nothing on the island, and nothing in the water, and nothing to give him any clue as to the reason Peter’s currently shuffling awkwardly on top of the Statue of Liberty instead of home, where he should be.

“Mr Stark, please, please, do _not_ tell her I was here.”

Tony narrows his eyes. “Why the secrecy, kid?”

In an instant, Peter clams up, lips pressed tightly together, and Tony tips his head, looks down his nose at him. “You want me to stretch the truth, you gotta give me something to work with. Otherwise we both know it’s gonna bite me in the ass someday,” he says, recalling the phone conversation – the one after he’d given the kid his suit back. Recalling the shrieking, the threats. And honestly? Completely justified. He has well and truly learned his lesson on this one. “So spill. What the hell were you doing out here, anyway?”

Peter hesitates.

“Uh,” he says, looking anywhere but at Tony – at the water, at the lights of the city, at the sky – and something occurs to Tony, then. Something that had started niggling at the back of his brain on his approach to the island.

His eyes focus back on those weird trails cutting across the sky.

“Say,” he drawls, “This wouldn’t have anything to do with that kid, would it? The one whose family bought the tower. What is it – Mr Pilot Light or something?”

Peter’s face flashes almost as red as his suit, and he inhales sharply, immediately spluttering.

“No!” he says a little too quick. “I mean - why – why would you –”

“Just a hunch,” Tony says dryly. He knew he’d seen those erratic streaks in the sky around New York before. Now he thinks of it, usually left behind after a huge flaming sky doodle that’s more often than not addressed to a certain spider-themed individual. He knows the two of them have been dancing around each other for a while, but hadn’t realised it had turned into anything. This – late night meetings in the middle of nowhere and missed curfews and all the _blushing_ – well, Tony’s obviously missed the mark by quite a few miles. “So, this is the ‘usual spot’ for you and Burning Boy, huh?”

Peter, face flushed, mumbles something, suddenly extremely interested in the mask in his hands.

Tony frowns. “What’s that?”

“It’s – it’s Human Torch,” Peter says, eyes flicking up quickly to meet his. “Not Burning Boy.”

Human Torch. Tony knew it was something stupid.

“Well, whatever he wants to call himself,” he says, waving a hand, “if this is the secret, I gotta tell you, it’s probably the worst-kept one in New York. The love letters in the sky aren’t exactly subtle, y’know.”

Peter’s eyes go wide, and he blushes to the tips of his ears as he chokes out, “They’re not – I mean, we’re not – I - I don’t -”

Whilst it’s moderately amusing and altogether endearing, Tony decides to put him out of his misery.

“Relax, kid. I don’t care.” And he really, really doesn’t. Not about that. “Honestly be a little hypocritical if I did. It’s none of my business what’s going on between you and Flame Head – I just -”

“We’re just friends,” Peter insists quickly, wringing his mask in his hands, twisting and untwisting. His cheeks burn pink. It’s kind of adorable, actually. Doesn’t give a whole lot of credibility to the claim of _just friends_ , but Tony’s not gonna push it – the kid already looks uncomfortable enough.

“Okay,” Tony says, “whatever the case, I just want to make sure you’re being careful.”

For some reason Peter looks shocked, then his expression drops into one of utter mortification. “Oh my God,” he groans, “you are _not_ giving me The Talk right now.”

“What?” Tony frowns. _Oh._ “No. No no. Jesus. Not like _that_ ,” he says quickly, feeling his own face start to colour. “I’d like to think your aunt and uncle beat me to the punch on that one.” The joke falls flat; Peter just gives him a pleading look, and Tony clears his throat. “I just meant – look, your buddy’s team? These guys are government poster-boys, okay? And you’re doing a great job out here, kid, but not exactly a state sanctioned one, if you catch my drift?”

Peter‘s face falls. And yeah, Tony can see he gets it. His voice goes quiet and flat as he says, “You think he’d sell me out.”

“I _think_ you need to be selective about who you let in your circle,” Tony clarifies, feeling a bit like he’s just kicked a puppy. But…Peter’s got to be careful. The Accords might have fizzled and all but died, but the remnants linger. There are still very real consequences for enhanced individuals operating outside of the law - no matter how many crimes they stop or lives they save - and, despite all the damage control Tony’s been doing, Spider-man has definitely drawn a lot of the wrong kind of attention. Peter’s a good kid. He doesn’t deserve to have his life ruined for putting his trust in the wrong person.

Intentions aside, Tony must have hit a nerve, though, because Peter scowls, face scrunching up.

“It’s not like that,” the kid says tightly, and Tony sighs.

“It never is until it is, Pete.”

Growing up the way he did, Tony had to learn that the hard way. Again and again. How many people had he gotten close to, only to find his intimate moments with them spilled across the tabloids a few weeks later for a quick buck and five minutes of fame? It sucked and it’s something that’s stayed with him. He doesn’t want that for Peter.

The kid’s eyes flash. “Well, _Johnny’s_ not like that,” he says, voice firm. Indignant. “He wouldn’t do that.”

_So it’s Johnny, now, is it?_

“I hope not. But from what I’ve seen, the kid sure spends a lot of time in the spotlight. Always seems to be running his mouth about something or other.”

Peter scoffs. “That’s just –“ He exhales hard, running a hand through his hair. “You’re seriously going to believe what the media says about him? Have you seen what the Bugle writes about _me_?”

“That’s different. The Bugle is trash, for starters, and you’re –“

But Peter cuts him off.

“And what about the stuff people used to say about _you_?”

Tony huffs a laugh. “The stuff they used to say about me was right on the money ninety percent of the time, actually,” he admits wryly, and Peter groans, frustrated.

“Why do you have to -  look, can’t you just trust that I’m not an idiot?”

Tony sobers at that. “I don’t think you’re an idiot, Pete,” he says, completely sincere. How could the kid even think that? He’s one of the most intelligent people Tony’s ever known, including himself – there aren’t many who can keep up with him, let alone give him a run for his money. Inexperienced, sure, but an idiot? Never. Peter’s got to know that.

“I think you’re a kid with a crush,” he continues, “and god knows even the smartest people do stupid shit when that’s the case. Ask Pepper.”

“It’s not a -”

“Not a crush,” Tony corrects, holding his hands up in a placating gesture. “Got it. Point is, I know it’s been good for you, having your pal Ned in the know about this side of your life – and May, too, but… not everyone’s your friend, Pete. Not everyone’s gonna have your best interests at heart. That Storm kid is a little too close to a whole host of people who definitely won’t.”

Peter shakes his head, exhales hard. “You don’t know anything about him.”

He looks… really upset, actually – tense and defensive - and it’s making Tony start to feel the same, getting his back up. The kid is missing the fucking point. Tony shakes his head, takes a breath, lets it out slowly.

“You’re right,” he concedes. “I don’t. But I do know a little something about the hoops these guys will have had to jump through to be operating out in the open the way they do. Ross’ll be breathing down their necks, and you can bet your ass he’s not going to let it go if he thinks for a second Golden Boy knows who you are, or knows how to find out. You really trust him not to slip up?”

Peter’s jaw is tight. Shoulders too.  He’s practically vibrating with tension, building and building beneath his skin like he’s a powder keg about to blow. Tony knows he should stop then, but he’s never really broken the habit of making sure his point gets hammered home. Call it a character flaw. Add it to the many.

“Look, kid – I’m not telling you this shit to hurt you. But I need to know you get what I’m saying. I’ve seen the ugly side of this gig, and I’m trying to make sure you don’t have to deal with all that.”

And yeah, he should have stopped, because that right there was the match to the powder keg.

“Well I didn’t ask you to! Okay?” It bursts out of Peter, his voice loud and strained, and _this_ , Tony thinks, this is the moment where his own father would have bit back – where Howard would have made damn sure Tony didn’t dare to raise his voice to him again without being well-aware of the consequences.

Tony is not his father.

“No,” he says evenly, “you didn’t. But I’m here anyway.”

He looks at the kid and the kid looks back, the lines of his face tight, breaths coming in and out fast. For a few moments, that’s all it is, then, with a long exhale, Peter deflates.

“That wasn’t fair,” he says, eyes apologetic.

“No,” Tony agrees.

Peter drags a hand across the back of his neck, eyes drifting towards the dark rolling water of the bay below. He takes a deep breath.

“The mask stays on. All right?” he says quietly, eyes flicking briefly to Tony’s to check if he’s going to interject. When he stays silent, Peter continues. “Johnny… doesn’t know my name. Or- or what I look like, or where I go to school. And he doesn’t know about any of the Avengers stuff - I wouldn’t tell him that. Or that I know you or anything, but…” He locks eyes with Tony, and says firmly, “he’s a good friend.”

He doesn’t let his gaze drop, almost daring Tony to disagree with him. Tony doesn’t, just waits.

“And if one day I decide I want to tell him, that’s _my_ choice, Mr Stark,” Peter continues, standing tall. He seems less sure of himself as he adds, “I don’t have to run it by you,” but he doesn’t back down, and Tony feels an odd sense of pride swell in his chest.

“Okay,” he says. “Okay, kid, I get it.”

Peter’s shoulders seem to relax a little at that, the tension there easing up.

“I know I need to be careful, okay, Mr Stark?” he says. “I know. It’s just… there’s not a whole lot of people who understand what it’s like to be able to do the things I can do. Even less that I can talk to about it. It’s just nice to have someone I can.”

And damn if that doesn’t make Tony feel like the worst person in the world. Friend, boyfriend, or whatever in between this Storm character is to the kid, all Peter had wanted was someone to confide in. Someone who might be able to relate to all the craziness that finds its way into his life. And here _he_ is giving him shit for it.

“I mean,” Peter continues, “I talk to Ned, but he doesn’t really get it, you know? And I can’t talk to May, because I know how much all this freaks her out still. She tries to act like it doesn’t, but I can see it on her face. Every time I mention it, it’s like she just…” He trails off, shakes his head. “I can’t talk to her.”

“Pete,” Tony says. He hadn’t realised the kid felt that way.

“No, no, I know I can talk to _you_ ,” Peter says quickly, misunderstanding. “But you’re so, y’know…” He makes a handwavey gesture.

Tony frowns, suddenly feeling a lot less sympathetic. “No, I do not ‘know’,” he says.

“Um…you’re…an adult?” Peter says, innocently.

“Nice save.”

Peter ducks his head. “Anyway, I just – Johnny gets it,” he says, a small smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.

It makes sense, of course. Who could understand a seventeen-year-old kid who unexpectedly gained superpowers better than another seventeen-year-old kid who unexpectedly gained superpowers? Tony’s been through some shit, seen some shit, done some shit, but being a teenager in this day and age and piling indescribable abilities on top of all the crap that already comes along with that? He’ll admit he can’t relate.

“And yeah, I can tell he’s curious about who I am, like, under the mask, but he’s never asked, and I don’t think he would,” Peter says. “He’s a good guy, Mr Stark. Really.”

Yeah, Tony’s starting to get that.

“He is, huh?”

Peter nods emphatically, and Tony’s not trying to be an ass, really, but he has to add, “So good he leaves you up here with no way of getting home?”

“Er,” Peter says, then he gives an awkward laugh, “Honestly, I think he sometimes just forgets not everyone can fly,” he says fondly. “Especially cause I’m always up in the sky. I was gonna call him, but then my phone was dead, so.” He shrugs. “And then you called.”

“Right. And you were so set on camping the night here you tried to get rid of me.”

Peter looks to the side, gives a breathy half-laugh . “Yeah, well, Johnny would’ve come back eventually,” he says. “Probably. And, I didn’t want to tell you why I was here ‘cause I knew you’d make it into a thing.”

Tony raises a brow. “A thing.”

“Yeah,” Peter says, cheeks tinging pink again. “A thing.”

“I’m not making it a thing.”

“You are definitely making it a thing.”

Tony rolls his eyes. Then he casts a curious look to Peter. “Is it? A thing.”

He doesn’t know why he asks. It’s really none of his business, like he said. But the cat’s out of the proverbial bag now. Maybe Peter wants to talk about it; maybe he needs to.

Peter, who is looking away, doesn’t say anything, and Tony’s about to tell him to forget it, that he shouldn’t have pried. But then Peter smiles, a little self-conscious.

“I don’t…um…I’m not sure. Yet,” he says. “I’m still trying to… y’know.”

Tony does.

“Plenty of time to figure stuff out, kid.”

Peter exhales hard. “Yeah. Yeah, I guess,” he says, nodding in agreement. He wrings his hands. “But, uh, I’m not really ready to talk to May about it yet. I _will._ I just….”

“Hey. She won’t hear it from me,” Tony says, holding his hands up, and Peter sighs in relief.

“Thanks, Mr Stark.”

“For what it’s worth, though, you should talk to her,” he says. Then he scoffs. “Think she’d react a lot better than the last time you gave her a surprise.”

Peter laughs at that. “No she definitely would.” He ducks his head with a wry smile. “But I think this time I kind of want to do it on my terms.”

“Got it,” Tony says with a swift nod. “Anyway, speaking of May – I promised your aunt I’d get you home before you turn into a pumpkin and we’re, uh, getting into week-old Jack-o’-lantern territory here.” A brisk breeze sweeps across the bay, and Peter shivers, only proving his point. Tony holds his arm out, beckoning Peter. “Come on. Stark Airways. Direct to Queens.”

Peter rolls his eyes, but he comes on over anyway, hopping onto the back of the suit and pulling his mask back over his face. Tony fires up the engines and then the two of them are in the sky, leaving Lady Liberty to her solitude once again.

“Thanks for picking me up,” Peter says behind him, leaning in close so his voice isn’t lost to the wind.

“Yeah, yeah. Leave me a five star review.” Tony turns his head. “You’re welcome, kid. But hey, maybe next date night takes place somewhere a little more accessible? Just a thought.”

At that, Peter groans, but it’s half-hearted.

“It’s not -” he starts to say, but he breaks off with a choked noise, the suit’s lenses widening.

There, in the distance, in the sky over Manhattan, a bright fiery image is forming. A blob of orange flame starts small in the sky, then grows. It gains little linear offshoots - one then another then another until there are eight of them in total. _A spider_. And Tony and Peter watch transfixed as glowing letters loop below it, cursive and clear.

_Call me._

“Not a date?” Tony says, trying not to laugh.

“Shut up,” Peter grumbles.

And although Tony can’t see Peter’s face under the mask, he could swear the kid was smiling.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, somehow this prompt that seemed kind boring and got me stuck for ideas ended up being the longest yet? I don’t know guys! I know it's a bit different, but I really hope you liked it. Please let me know!
> 
> I'm sorry as always for the long wait between updates, but rest assured I intend to keep going. Thank you so much to everyone who is still sticking with me despite the slow posting, and to each and every one of you who leaves a review. Reading through them is what gives me the motivation to power through.


	10. Bruises

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNINGS HERE FOR UNHEALTHY COPING MECHANISMS AND GRIEF

 

 

The window squeaks against the frame as he slides it open.

It’s something that happens when it gets cold. Peter forgets about it every time he comes home – _every time –_ and as the metal slides and whines, high-pitched and grating, he thinks next time, next time will be the time he remembers.

It’s not too much of a thing, nowadays, making sure he’s quiet, making sure May doesn’t hear him coming home. She knows he goes out; she knows what he’s doing. She’s known for a while. Peter has the sneaking suspicion she actually prefers it when he makes noise, no matter the time. That she even listens out for the telltale creak of the window – such a small sound, really, but one that makes all the difference to her, one that tells her that her nephew is home and safe and not somewhere becoming the latest victim in a long line of Parker family tragedies. For this reason, even though Peter always forgets about the squeak, it never bothers him.

Tonight though…

Tonight Peter curses the sound, seemingly infinitely louder for his desire to return home unnoticed. It bounces off the walls of the small alcove that the window sits in, echoing, and Peter’s hand stills.

Slowly, slow enough to be silent, he inches the panel up until there’s enough room for him to slip through the gap and into his room.

Well, slip is probably being generous. It’s more of an undignified, awkward clamber, and he winces as he lands in a half-crouch.

“Ow.”

It comes out on a breath, almost a whine. His eyes are squeezed shut. It takes a moment before he can stand.

The apartment is silent, and Peter wonders if May’s already gone to bed. It would be unusual for her to do so before he’s home, sure, but not altogether unexpected, especially with all the extra shifts she’s been putting in. Peter has hardly seen her all week, and when he does, it’s with a cup of coffee in her hand and a weary smile on her face.

He listens for a few more seconds, just to be sure, then he pulls himself up and the mask off. _Carefully._ The suit is next – Peter groans softly as he pulls his arms from the sleeves, and kicks the rest of it into the corner when it pools at his feet. He wants nothing more than to flop onto the bed and sleep forever, but curiosity gets the better of him.

He shuffles to his desk, and stares. He can’t help the soft breath that escapes him at the reflection greeting him in the mirror there. He thought he felt bad; he looks worse.

He’s heard the expression black and blue, but this isn’t that. This is red and purple, covering his whole left side and brushed across his chin, his cheek, his temple. He turns. Sees the dark shadows dotting along his spine and marring his right hip, just visible over the waistband of his boxers.

He’s a fucking mess.

His hand ghosts along his ribs, the skin there hot and pained beneath his barely-touching fingertips. He thinks maybe one or two of the bones are cracked, if not broken. Every inhale brings an uncomfortable shift that shouldn’t be; every exhale leaves him feeling hollow, like his chest could just keep collapsing and collapsing until he disappears inside himself.

He closes his eyes.

It hadn’t been enough. Tonight. He stopped three grand theft autos, showed some tourists the quickest way back to their hotel, pulled a drunk guy out of the way of a delivery truck, broke up more post-bar fights than he cares to count, and it wasn’t enough.

The muggings were better – four of them (gotta love New York) - and he’s pretty sure he might have actually stopped a potential murder. But standing there in that alleyway, heart pounding and knuckles aching and the girl he’d saved crying out _thank you_ s as the guy lay bleeding under a net of webbing, it still hadn’t been enough.

Peter doesn’t think it’ll ever be enough.

He blows out a breath, halting and stuttered and a hand braced against his side. It’s times like these he wishes aspirin still actually did something. As it is, all he can do is wait. Wait for his healing factor to kick in and turn the purples and reds to blues and blacks to greens and yellows until it’s like they were never there at all.

Moving like he’s aged a million years, he switches out his boxers and reaches for the t-shirt on top of the clean pile he’s supposed to have sorted days ago. The one he grabs ends up being the stupid _I survived my trip to NYC_ one that he’s never managed to bring himself to throw out - big and baggy and perfect for his current predicament.

He’s got both arms in the sleeves and is struggling to lift them high enough to slip his head through the neck, breaths coming short and shallow, when he hears it. There’s the click of a door opening and the soft sound of socked feet padding down the hall.

“Peter?”

_Shit._

There’s a knock at his door and his breaths are whistling in and out and he can’t move his aching body fast enough. May calls his name again, the door opens a crack and Peter drops his arms, cradling the t-shirt against his chest like a shield.

“Ah, I thought I heard -”

May’s words die in her throat as she takes in the sight of him, the smile sliding from her face with a sharp inhale. The light clicks on, and the sudden change in brightness has Peter squinting. When he recovers it’s to May’s horrified expression. Peter stands there like a deer in headlights, nowhere to go and nowhere to hide as her eyes flick from the badly covered splotches on his side, to the swollen and bruised knuckles clutching the t-shirt, to the marks on his face, his split lip.

She’s seen him beat up before. Coming home from a rough night with scrapes and breaks and bruises is nothing new. They’ve fallen into a sort-of dance around it, actually: May patches him up the best she can, asks him which little old lady didn’t appreciate the help crossing the street that day (it’s always Mrs Griggs, the crotchety old lady who lives below them and bashes her ceiling with a broom whenever their T.V is on too loud), and May laughs at his answer, although the joke has long expired, and Peter laughs too, and despite the elephant in the room whispering of what could have been, it’s always okay. She sends him off to bed with an ice pack and a quick kiss to the top of his head that says _I’m proud of what you’re doing even if it terrifies me_ and they’re okay.

Tonight, though… tonight is different. Peter knows it is. It’s the reason he’d tried so hard to be stealthy and why he’s so angry he forgot about the window. He holds himself still under the intensity of May’s gaze, a million excuses forming and dying without ever touching his lips.

“May,” is all he manages to croak out.

She just shakes her head. And keeps shaking it, and shaking it. And then, to Peter’s horror, she bursts into tears – huge uncontrollable sobs that wrack her body and shake her shoulders.

At the sight, it feels like Peter’s blood turns to ice. He stiffens, unsure of what to do. Honestly? He’s _scared_. May isn’t a crier, not really. She’ll have a little sniffle at the cute rescue-puppy videos on Facebook, sure, and she’s a sucker for a romantic movie, but _this_ – Peter can count on one hand he’s seen her break down like this, and it terrifies him.

“I’m sorry,” he finds himself whispering. Over and over again, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

May keeps crying, hands coming up to cover her face, and Peter untangles himself from the shirt, reaching out towards her in an aborted motion of comfort. He steps back. He doesn’t know what to do.

He doesn’t know what to _do._

May looks up, taking a deep breath that hitches on its way in as she wrestles for composure. She swipes her fingers under her eyes, but her lashes stay wet.

“Peter,” she says as another tear tumbles unbidden down to her chin. She looks heartbroken. “Peter, baby, what are you doing to yourself?”

He takes a breath. His chest feels hollow in a way that has nothing to do with the ache in his ribs.

“I’m… I’m not -”

( _It’ll never be enough_ )

His voice trails off.

“Peter.”                                

May’s face is sad – so sad – as she comes closer. Her eyes are shining. She reaches out slowly, like she’s approaching a wounded animal, and in that moment, Peter almost feels like one, wound tight and fighting the instinctual urge to bolt, to run from this situation, from the sadness in her eyes. One hand gently covers his, the other lightly touching his shoulder, and he lets himself be turned, holds himself still as May’s eyes trace the bruising over his ribs, tears spilling over onto her cheeks as she sees how bad it really is.

She takes a shaky breath.

“What happened?”

“Got thrown into a wall,” Peter says hoarsely. He can’t look at her, can’t bear to see her crying and know that he’s the reason why. Not tonight.

Not tonight.

May doesn’t say anything for a long time. The silence is broken only by her occasional sniffle. She’s not crying anymore, not really, but there’s a lingering sadness to her voice when she finally speaks.

“I got sent home today,” she says quietly, and Peter looks up. Her eyes are far away. “Said I’ve done too many hours this week. Breaking health and safety or something. I-  I didn’t even realise.” She shakes her head. Takes a deep breath. “I’m sorry I haven’t been here.”

When her eyes turn to his they are soft, but Peter feels the weight of her gaze like it is boring into the very core of him, flaying him open. His breaths are coming tiny and fast and it hurts, shifting his ribs, but he can’t stop. His lips feel numb as he mumbles, “No. No, s’okay.”

“It’s not.” Her fingers brush across his bruised cheek, a whisper of a touch. “Baby, this isn’t okay.”

Peter looks down, and the carpet blurs. Because May’s right. He knows she’s right, and yet…

Tonight. That relief he’d felt when he’d swung into the path of The Shocker - into the path of a fight he couldn’t win so easily - was palpable. And as he’d thrown his fists and Shultz had thrown him, again and again and again until his bones creaked and his lip bled, for a moment – just a moment – Peter had forgotten.

And in the end it still hadn’t been enough.

His fingers tighten around the fabric in his hands, the skin over his swollen knuckles stretching painfully. Something aching sits in his throat, and he swallows hard. Swallows again.

May’s voice is soft. Oh so soft.

“He wouldn’t want this for you.”

It’s all it takes for the first tear to spill over. Then comes another, and another.

“I don’t want this for you.”

For a second he thinks May’s hand is shaking, loosely clasped around his upper arm, but then he realises it’s him. He’s shaking. Knowing it doesn’t help him stop.

 “You have to stop blaming yourself.”

Peter doesn’t think he knows how.

 _I miss him,_ he wants to say. He doesn’t know why he can’t. Why the words feel like they’re stuck in his throat, choking him. Two years tomorrow and it isn’t any easier. _I miss him so much._

May’s hands gently cup his face, tilting his head until he lifts his eyes to hers.

“Hey,” she says, and her eyes are shining again. He sees understanding there, a reflection of his own grief. “I miss him too.”

Peter buries his face in her shoulder, and her arms come up to rub small circles into his back, soothing, as she murmurs in his ear that it’s okay. That he's okay. His ribs protest the position, but there’s a deeper ache that hurts worse – one that won’t be gone come morning. One that won’t ever be gone.

“I’ll call school in the morning,” May says, pressing a kiss into his hair. “Tell them you’re taking the day off.”

He looks at his hands where they’re pressed to May’s back. The bruises over his knuckles have finally started to change colour. Started to heal.

“They’ll be gone in the morning,” Peter mumbles into her shoulder.

She pulls back, then. Gives him a strange, sad look. A hand cups his cheek.

“I know.”

Peter thinks he understands.

While he sleeps, the marks on his skin will slowly fade, changing from purples and reds to blues and blacks to greens and yellows until it’s like they were never there at all.

Some bruises, though, some bruises never heal.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What? Another chapter? And it didn't take at least a month? I know! I can't believe it either!
> 
> What can I say? I love you guys, and I love being able to give you chapters. Thank you to everyone who's sticking with me, new readers and old, and know that every time I get a comment from you my heart does a little dance.
> 
> Please let me know what you think! 
> 
> (Also, at the risk of sounding like I don't have my own ideas, is there anything specific you guys would really really like to see in this series? I can't completely promise to follow through, but I'm nothing if not a people pleaser, and I want to know what'll make you happy!)


End file.
